


Blood is Thicker Than Pabst

by CupcakeGumdrop3



Series: Plastic Things [3]
Category: South Park
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Drug Addiction, Drug Dealing, F/M, Family, Family Feels, Family Issues, Fatherhood, Fights, Gambling, Guns, Marriage, Motherhood, Poverty, Running Away, Strained Relationships, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-05
Updated: 2020-05-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:48:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 25,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23871880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CupcakeGumdrop3/pseuds/CupcakeGumdrop3
Summary: Blood is Thicker Than Pabst.This work chronicles the traumas of growing up McCormick, mainly focused around milestones in Kevin's life.  How can you look out for your younger siblings when no one's looking out for you?
Relationships: Carol McCormick/Stuart McCormick, Laura Tucker/Thomas Tucker
Series: Plastic Things [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1294526
Comments: 14
Kudos: 18





	1. Kevin - 4 months old

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little something I was writing while having writer’s block during the High School years this past summer (finally finished editing last week).  
> This work chronicles the McCormicks before the High School AU, from Kevin as a baby, to 18 years old.  
> Take a magnifying glass to the tumultuous ups and downs of Carol and Stuart's marriage.  
> I felt like something was missing in between the memories of their failures and the times they were doing better.  
> Real quick, I will say that in my head for this AU it wasn't all bad. This is a family who loves each other like crazy, and for some years they only had each other. It's just that in between the love and loyalty, there's toxicity, violence, and selfishness. One doesn't make up for the other, they just coexist in a chaos that everybody has learned to live with, unfortunately. 
> 
> Here’s my idea of the McCormick family darkness throughout the years, Big Brother Kevin ™, and all of the friends in town who gave them food, shelter… and enablement.

Kevin - 4 months

“Stuart… Stuart!” 

“What?” 

“Put that shit down, you promised you’d take care of the baby!” 

“He’s fine, babies cry.” Stuart mumbled dismissively. 

“He needs his diaper changed and I’m going to be late for my interview!” Carol searched around for her purse, accidentally shouldering the diaper bag instead, before realizing her mistake and correcting it, all while balancing a fussy baby in her arms. 

“In a minute.” Stuart grumbled dismissively. 

“The bus leaves in 10!” Carol frantically looked between her husband and the clock, bouncing her baby up and down in her arms in an effort to soothe him, despite all the shouting undoing her progress. 

“I’LL BE THERE IN A FUCKING MINUTE!” Stuart hollered over towards the direction of his wife, without looking up from what he was doing. 

“It’s ok, baby, Mommy is just going to put you down now, there… don’t cry, baby… don’t cry — FUCK, STUART!” 

“I’M ON MY WAY!” 

“Daddy’s gonna be with you real soon.” Carol blew her baby a kiss as he writhed and screamed on the carpet, alone. She tried not to look down at him when his little baby arms reached for her as she walked away. “Father of the fucking year.” She snarled at her husband as she passed him, snatching her blazer from the counter in front of him. Stuart jumped as she passed him, but it was more for concern over the jacket flying so close to his fragile stash than it was his actual safety. Stuart's arm shot out protectively to barricade around his drugs. Carol just scoffed and slammed the front door. 

Kevin continued crying in the background as Stuart sorted fine powder into thin white lines. 

“It’s ok, baby, Daddy’s comin’.” Stuart called out lazily as he lined up his hit. The baby continued to cry as Stuart leaned his head down and snorted up his destructive habit. Stuart leaned back and held his nose, wincing as numbing powder sprinkled down the back of his throat. He resisted the urge to cough and put away the rest of his stash.

This was not Stuart’s preferred method of getting high, not even close, but when Carol found out he was using again after the baby was born she made him switch to a smokeless ingestion, seeing as how the baby could pick up secondhand smoke fumes, yada yada yada. 

Not to mention the landlord would kick them out with little to no concern about the baby, and Carol made it clear the minute she moved in with him that she never wanted to be homeless again. She _would not_ be homeless again. 

“Daddy’s here.” Stuart muttered, although Kevin was halfway across the room, and still crying. 

Stuart shoved his cigar box back into the pantry and closed the cabinet. There was still some residual powder on the counter. Stuart quickly licked his thumb and swiped it through, rubbing it across his gums and licking his teeth. 

“On my way, bud, just one second.” Kevin had rolled over onto his stomach by now and was now screaming at the top of his lungs. Stuart washed his hands at the sink and dusted them dry on his pants. 

“Ok Kevin, ok buddy, here we go.” Stuart picked up the kid and bounced him on his shoulder, recoiling at the sheer volume of shrill screeching right next to his ear. 

“Mommy had to leave, but she’ll be back soon.” He consoled, to no avail. “Jesus Christ.” He muttered to himself, the screaming only escalating the longer he held his child. 

“What is it, do you need to be changed?” He asked out loud. He took the shrieking reply to be a yes. Plus he remembered Carol mentioning it on her way out the door. “Ok, we’ll get you changed, here we go.” 

Stuart carried Kevin into the bedroom, the only one in this tiny-ass apartment. 

He lay his son down on the Double Mattress and got him changed. 

Once he was all clean again, Kevin did not stop crying. 

“Oh no,” Stuart whined, “what? What is it now? I changed you, what _else_ is wrong?” 

Kevin continued to scream and reach his little hands out in front of him, with his tiny fingers stretched out, looking for someone who had long since walked out the door. The kid loved his mother more than Stuart. It hurt. The young father didn't want to admit how bitter and jealous it made him feel.

Kevin screamed and screamed, maddeningly, with no sign of relaxing. 

Stuart made in involuntary whimpering noise in frustration. He didn't know what else he could do.

Sometimes being a parent made Stuart feel inferior, and that made him feel hopeless and angry. 

Sometimes he would lay in bed with the love of his life, and the most beautiful miracle they could've ever made together, and Stuart would be happy — watching Kevin grab his tiny toes, tickling his chubby tummy, or playing peek-a-boo while he laughed that little bell-like laugh that all babies seemed to possess. Hearing his beautiful son giggle and laugh was the most beautiful sound Stuart had ever heard… 

But sometimes Stuart would find himself sleep deprived, holding a screaming child who didn’t ever let up and didn’t even seem to want to be alone with him without Mommy around, and he would dream about the life he was missing out on at only 21 years old. 

Tears of frustration and exhaustion fell down Stuart's cheeks as he rocked his screaming son in his arms. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror and thought how strange he looked: to be holding a baby — his baby — while he himself still had a little bit of baby fat on his own cheeks. Stuart pulled his dilated gaze away from the surreal reflection and continued to attempt to soothe his screaming son, to no avail. 

"Why won't this kid stop crying?" Stuart wondered out loud, wiping his wet cheeks on his shoulder and continuing to bounce Kevin in his arms, detachedly. 

His gaze drifted lazily and disinterestedly away from his child as he continued to rock him on autopilot, daydreaming about the life he had given up for this screaming brat who didn't even seem to appreciate the sacrifices that his parents had to make for him.

If Stuart were less of a prideful man, he would've disappeared by now. 

By the time Carol got home, Kevin was sitting on the floor in front of the TV, teething on a frozen plastic ring and hiccuping, little tears still wet against his cheeks. 

Stuart was sitting on the couch behind him, drinking a beer. 

“Hey, Babe.” Carol greeted monotonously as she kissed Stuart on the top of his head, before walking around the couch to collect Kevin. “Hi, Baby.” She cooed. “Wha— Stuart, he has snot everywhere, you can’t wipe his nose?” She scolded, wiping baby snot with the edge of her nice shirt. 

“I didn’t notice. Otherwise, obviously, I would’ve.” He explained, taking another sip of beer. 

He watched the way she was with him. The way she played with his fine little hairs and kissed his rosy cheeks. Stuart’s eyes narrowed as he brought the beer bottle back up to his lips. “You coddle him too much.” Stuart stated flatly. 

Carol turned around on the carpet to face him. “What is that supposed to mean?” She snapped at him. 

Stuart took a sighing breath and gestured while he spoke. “He’s too attached to you, it took him 3 hours to quiet down today. Gave me a headache.” He explained calmly, taking another swig. 

Carol stood up and carried Kevin over to his high chair before coming back to respond to her husband, with venom practically dripping down from her teeth. “Maybe if you paid attention to him more he wouldn’t _need_ me so much.” She whispered harshly, emphasizing the word ‘need’ by smacking Stuart heavily with a couch pillow. Carol turned around and stormed her way into the kitchen. 

“Dinner’s on the stove.” Stuart called to her over his shoulder. His show had come back on.

Carol slammed the utensil drawer. “But you didn’t do the dishes, like I asked.” It wasn’t a question. 

Stuart turned around to take in the state of the messy kitchen that he must’ve completely glazed over while being in such a rush to make Spaghetti-O’s for him and his wife. “Oh. Uh, no, I guess not.” He grumbled unapologetically. 

Carol slammed her palms against the counter and exhaled with a whimper. Stuart turned off the TV and turned around. “So… how did she interview go?” He asked her, knowingly. 

“Not good.” Carol wiped tears off her face as Stuart walked over to wrapped his arms around her. “They were really interested in me at first, getting my hopes up, until they said they were more interested in candidates that have more than just a high school diploma... I almost thought I had it…” Her voice broke. Carol laid her arms atop Stuart’s as he rocked her back and forth, dropping his head against her shoulder and sighing empathetically. She squeezed his grip around her even tighter and stilled herself in the brief silence, as she matched her husband’s steady breathing. “I don’t even understand,” Carol shrugged, “it’s not like a community college diploma in American History would have prepared me for bagging groceries any more than I’m already prepared now.” 

“I know, baby.” Stuart commiserated, kissing her above the ear and resting his forehead against her temple. 

“It’s not fair.” She whispered sadly. 

Stuart pulled back and looked at the side of her face with a hurt expression. “I have interviews lined up for Thursday and Friday, you know that.” 

“That’s not what I mean.” Carol sniffled. “I would’ve graduated. I had most of the credits… but then Kevin came and I never got to finish. And now, we are _always_ going to be picked last, and the odds are _always_ going to be stacked against us. It’s not fair.” 

Stuart pulled Carol close to his chest. “We’ll figure something out, we always will…” It was then that Stuart decided to bring up a little business idea that had been floating around his head for weeks. “I… do have one idea…” Carol pulled back to look at him questioningly. “...What if we start cooking again?”

“No way!” Carol dismissed firmly, shoving away from Stuart and pacing around the kitchen as he continued. 

“Hear me out!” He pleaded, “we already know the ropes, we’ve done it once before, we can do it again!” 

“Are you crazy!” She hissed, “Last time you _promised_ me, you would only sell enough to save up for the wedding and baby supplies, and _stop_ once Kevin was born! The answer is _no!”_

“Think of all the money we could save! Making our own shit… think of all the money we could make…” He tempted her. 

Carol rolled her eyes. " _'Think of the money we could save,'_ we'd save _tons_ of money if you'd just fuckin' quit—"

"—You and I both know you're just waiting until you can stop breastfeeding, and then you'll hop right back on this wagon with me." Stuart cooed tenderly as he ran his hands down and then back up his wife's arms soothingly. His voice was gentle and comforting; the look in his eyes: electrifying. It blazed behind his bright blue irises and spread like wildfire to Carol's soft brown ones. 

She pursed her lips. “What if we get caught.” Carol reasoned, with slightly less strength than before. “If we go to prison, Kevin goes into foster care—”

“I can promise you, without a doubt, that you will never go to prison, because I won’t let them take you.” Stuart grabbed Carol by the shoulders and looked into her eyes wildly. “If I get caught, I will make _sure_ they know that you don’t know _anything._ You have my word on that.” 

Carol pursed her lips together, not completely sure that Stuart wouldn’t sell her out to save his own ass in a heartbeat. 

“I don’t know…” She wavered, the more she looked around their tiny, dilapidated apartment, the more the idea seemed good to her. 

“We’ll be extra careful, and we won’t deal, we’ll just cook and sell to people we know. No turf wars, no territory, we’ll stay out of all that.” Carol scoffed and rolled her eyes. “We’ll be so careful, Babe.” He promised, convincingly.

“How can you be so sure?” Carol whispered. 

“Trust me.” Stuart pleaded. 

It was now 8:00 pm, and Carol and Stuart were sitting up in bed, scheming in whispers as Kevin ate his dinner and drifted off to sleep sweetly in Carol’s arms. 


	2. Kevin - 2 years old

**Kevin - 2**

“Kevin… come on, say what you want…”

Carol and Stuart’s 2 year old child was screaming and throwing a temper tantrum.A scene that was made only slightly comical by the adorable halloween costume that Carol had hand-sewn for him out of an actual burlap potato sack and decorated with a few sharpie markers. Little Kevin sat there, dressed as Oogie Boogie from _Nightmare Before Christmas,_ in what was essentially just a very itchy onesie with a very itchy hat on top.He was fed up with eating breakfast at the table, impatient to start trick-or-treating despite it being _hours_ before trick-or-treating actually started, and he was growing fussy.That’s what Carol gets for putting him in his costume early, but he just looks so darn cute. 

There was something across the room that Kevin wanted, but he refused to use his words to ask for it. 

Carol followed his furrowed glare to the sippy cup on top of the counter. 

“This?”Carol picked up the cup and held it in her hands. 

Kevin began reaching for it, pouting from his seat at the table.

“You know what this is.What is it?”

Kevin whined defiantly, and stood up on his chair to better reach across the table towards his mother. 

Carol pulled the cup backwards behind her shoulder and demanded, “use your words!”

Kevin — being the stubborn child that he was — simply slammed his hands against the table as he fell back into his chair and began screaming his head off, feeling humiliated and frustrated; like he was being tested, and failing miserably. 

“Kevin, baby, you can do it, just say what it is you want and I can get it for you.”Carol encouraged.She tried not to appear as exhausted as she felt as she wiped at the sore skin under her baggy eyes.Somehow that tiny baby just knew that the more tired she felt, the less of a fight it was going to be before he would inevitably get his way.And he took advantage of her weaknesses every time.

Kevin continued to scream.

Stuart came wandering in from the bedroom, tying a tie around his neck — off to a job interview for a management position at a local megastore that he was grossly unqualified for, but the money was promised to be good, if he could get it.

He looked around the room curiously for a second, before his eyes locked on the sippy cup that Carol had set down on the table in front of her. 

“Oh,” Stuart exclaimed, like he’d just figured something out, “here you go,” and handed their son the sippy cup.Kevin took it victoriously, smiling through tears and snot trailing down his face. He had gotten his way uncompromisingly yet again.

Carol protested defeatedly, but it was too late. 

She turned her gaze to her husband, who was smiling happily. 

“Good morning, love of my life,” he greeted cheerily before giving his wife a kiss on the top of her head and walking over to the pantry to get a bowl of cereal.

“Why did you do that?”Carol asked annoyedly.

Stuart paused, confused, a fistful of cornflakes stuffing his cheeks.

“…That’s what he was cryin’ about, right?”He mumbled, spitting cereal flakes in front of him as he chewed. 

“Yes,” Carol explained, actively calming herself down before she completely lost it on her husband, “but I was _trying_ to get him to _earn_ it.He needs to start _asking_ for things, rather than just _gesturing_ for them.” Carol stood up and whispered quietly to her husband, “He’s 2 years old, he’s supposed to be talking by now—”

“Oh,” Stuart interrupted, almost spitting corn flakes on Carol’s shirt as he shoveled another fistful into his mouth and pointed toward their son, “Kevin knows how to talk, right buddy?”Stuart turned towards his son, who only nodded slowly in affirmation, still nursing on his sippy cup. 

“No,” Carol continued gritting her teeth and turning back to Stuart, “he is responding and understanding, but he has not said one real word, he is not _talking._ It is a milestone that he is already supposed to have reached a year ago, and it is _not happening.”_

“Carol, he knows how, he just doesn’t want to.”Stuart defended their son nonchalantly, shrugging, then placing the cereal box haphazardly back into the cabinet, and not fixing it as it fell over sideways on its shelf.

“That’s the problem, _Stuart,”_ Carol closed the still-open cabinet and followed him back into their bedroom, “he’s not _developing_ at the rate he’s supposed to.Physically, yes, mentally, yes, motor skills, ok, but he is _not speaking_ , and that is a _problem!”_

Carol slammed down her hand on the dresser in order to get her husband’s attention away from his own reflection in the mirror.He jumped, and looked at her like she was acting crazy.

“You need to talk to him more, and make sure he talks _back,_ do you understand that?”

“I talk to him plenty,” Stuart dismissed with a shrug.

“No... you don’t." Carol grit her teeth in frustration, "If you’re the only one home all day, you need to talk to him beyond just asking what he wants for lunch—”

“What else is there to talk to a toddler about, huh? He’s a baby!”Stuart asked, a little annoyed and genuinely confused how else he was supposed to raise his child beyond asking him to point to which movie he wanted to watch, and confirm whether or not he wanted peanut butter crackers for lunch.

Carol stood stunned, mouth hanging open, completely flabbergasted at the lack of instinctual common sense in her husband’s child rearing abilities.

“Just… go to your interview, I can’t argue with you about this right now,” Carol shook her head, completely fed up and exhausted with this fight. 

“What… _argue?”_ Stuart furrowed his brows, "we're having a civil conversation, Carol—"

"—the fact that you see it that way is a real problem." Carol scoffed condescendingly, in a way that _she knew_ made her husband feel completely stupid. She didn't mean to, but she also didn't take it back. 

Stuart was beginning to grow offended, “What is so wrong about the way I parent, _this time,_ Carol?”

“We’ll talk about it later.”She insisted, glancing at the clock and noticing the time.

“Well, no, we _can’t_ talk about it later, because if I’m thinking about this all day then I won’t do well on my interview—”

“So it’s my fault if you don’t get this job?”Carol yelled,“That you are _beyond_ unqualified for?”

Stuart felt like a bowling ball had been launched into his stomach.

“Well, don’t say that,” Stuart sighed defeatedly, a weak slump in his shoulders. 

Carol bit her lip and shook her head, but it was too late to take back the words she’d already said. _Fuck._

“No, I'm sorry.”Carol sighed in resignation.“I’m sorry, I’m sorry babe, come here.”Carol wrapped her arms around her husband.She pulled back and looked him in the eyes “You just go out there and focus on giving a really good interview; and I’m going to go to the library with Kevin to check out some books that you can read to him while I’m at work tomorrow, ok?”

“Ok…” Stuart nodded skeptically, panic and doubt setting in his mind as his wife’s words replayed over and over again in his head: _‘beyond unqualified’…_

Carol placed what she hoped was an encouraging kiss on her husband’s cheek.“You’re going to do great,” she promised, feeling the smile fade from her lips. 

Stuart nodded, but now he was growing less and less sure.If his own wife — the one person he trusted more than anyone else — didn’t believe in him…

An uncomfortable silence settled between them.

“Well, you’ve gotta get going,” Carol pointed out in a whisper, stepping away from her husband.

“Yeah,” he agreed, despite desperately needing one last hug from her before walking out the door. 

“I hope you get it,”Carol called awkwardly from where she stood just a few too many steps away from her husband.She hoped it sounded encouraging. 

Stuart turned over his shoulder with his hand on the doorknob and smiled defeatedly, “Yeah.Me too.” 


	3. Kevin - 3 years old

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let's get some Tucker backstory in there too.

**Kevin - 3**

“So, it turns out, I’m not pregnant… false alarm…”

Carol’s heart sank a little bit.“Aw.Honey, I’m sorry.You ok?”

“Yeah.” Laura sighed, “I’m just getting a little worried, you know?”Laura was speaking at an uncharacteristically high pitch, in an effort to come off more positive about the situation than she was actually feeling.“I mean we’ve been trying for almost two years, and I’ve been doing the hormone shots for a few months now… maybe it’s time to start exploring other options…”

“Yeah.Maybe.” Carol agreed, twisting her short, braided pigtails up into flat buns on the sides of her head, and pinning them in place. 

“It’s just…” Carol could see Laura’s expression darken as she stared at her mirrored reflection, “what if it’s me?” Laura whispered. 

“What do you mean?” Carol turned around to properly look at her friend.

Laura’s eyes glazed over with tears.She blinked towards the ceiling and rolled her eyes, embarrassed at herself for getting so emotional so quickly. She tried to blame it on the Repronex in her system.

“What if it’s my eggs or something?Or just _my_ _body?_ I just… I’m sorry, it’s stupid.”

“No it’s not.” Carol insisted, cutting off her friend before she could say anything else invalidating about her feelings. 

Laura swallowed a gulp of air and whispered, “I would love _any_ child that I got to hold in my arms and call my baby, whether that be through that new IVF treatment, an egg donor, a surrogate, or adoption.But…” Laura’s voice began to shake as a year and a half's worth of anxieties, pain, and loss culminated into one pathetically frail utterance, “I just always pictured myself pregnant one day, you know?”

Carol wrapped her arms around her friend and smiled encouragingly.“You will be.One day.” 

Both of them knew there was no guarantee.But the sentiment was soothing nonetheless. 

Carol let go and comically offered her long white sleeve as a tissue to dry Laura’s eyes.Laura laughed and refused, feeling just a little bit lighter.

“Alright!”Stuart’s voice rang through the hallway as he and Kevin prepared to make their grand entrance.“Get ready!”

Stuart and Kevin stepped out into the hallway — Stuart wearing a white, long sleeved v-neck under a black vest with jeans, and Kevin was dressed in all brown, wearing his little white bathrobe, his face entirely covered in green makeup paint.He had a few wrinkle lines drawn in with his mother’s eyeliner (courtesy of his father).A crafted set of pointed felt-and-cardboard ears were sewn into a headband that sat atop his little head and stuck outto the sides adorably, (courtesy of his mother).They were almost too big for the proportions of his head, but Carol didn’t care, he still looked so adorable in the thrifty set of ears she had made for her boy.

“He’s Han Solo, and-and I’m Yoda from _Star Wars!”_ Kevin explained excitedly to Laura before striking a pose and furrowing his brow with intensity. 

“Wow!Look at you!”Laura chuckled lightheartedly, wiping at her face.

“I got the force!”Kevin announced proudly and with such intensity that it really came out a giant mess of baby babble.Kevin turned his flexed hand towards an empty plastic cup that sat stilly atop the kitchen table. 

Stuart placed his hands on his son’s shoulders.“Remember what we said about the force, buddy, it only works with your eyes closed.” 

Kevin closed his eyes and Stuart nodded towards the cup. Laura (who was closest) quickly knocked it over with a twitch of her hand. 

Kevin’s eyes flung open wide with wonder.“Did it.” He whispered to himself amazedly.

Stuart walked over to his wife and kissed her on her cheek. 

“You look fantastic.”He praised with a charming drawl, looking her up and down slowly, hungrily, taking in her outfit that showed off her figure much more than the costume had technically called for.

“Yeah, well I already had the shirt, so I just paired it with white jeans and there you go.” Carol smiled at her husband, adjusting the chunky belt that sat low across her hips.

“Is Thomas joining us?”Stuart turned towards Laura and asked politely.

“No, he has too much work he needed to do at home tonight.”Laura explained, conveniently leaving out the parts about Thomas being so introverted that the thought of leaving his house again after 5pm makes him excessively irritable.

“Well,” Stuart smiled and clapped his hands together, “let’s get trick-or-treating!” He announced animatedly.

Kevin cheered excitedly and he ran to the front door. 

Kevin spoke up again as his father worked on bundling him up in a tiny red scarf. “I wanna hold,” big breath, “Aunt Laura’s hand!”Kevin announced (his voice doing that adorable toddler squeak on the word ‘hand’).

“Is that ok?” Stuart asked with a chuckle.

Laura felt a faint sting of tears spring to her eyes again.

“Of course it is!”Laura smiled, offering her hand to the tiny Yoda in front of her. 

“Puppy will hold my other hand.”Kevin explained in choppy baby English to the adults, holding on tightly to his beanie baby.Carol and Stuart agreed, intertwining their fingers lovingly as everybody headed out the door. 

Kevin wrapped his little gloved fingers around Laura’s and looked up at her.

Laura squeezed his little hand lightly and smiled back, ignoring the faint ache in her chest.


	4. Kevin - 4 years old

**Kevin - 4 - August**

A heavily pregnant Laura found herself sitting on the McCormick’s couch, alone, watching Kevin play with paper dolls on the floor while the adult McCormicks were screaming at each other in their bedroom.Kevin didn’t even seem to notice. 

“This one’s blue and red, so he’s Superman, Daddy made him, see the ’S’ on his chest?Look!”

“Yeah, I see, that’s great.Why don’t you make him fly over the city, I think I heard some cries for help over by the front door!”

Kevin furrowed his eyebrows and tilted his head confusedly for a second, before shrugging anddeciding that if Aunt Laura wouldn’t play with him then he and Superman would just save the city alone.

Laura struggled to get up off of the couch and waddled her way closer to the door to eavesdrop.She grabbed a glass of water from the kitchen and drank it over the sink, eyes and ears trained towards the distressed wails of her best friend.

“$5,000?!$5,000 YOU LOST _OVERNIGHT!”_ Carol was sobbing in between her words. 

“I’m sorry!I’m sorry, ok?You don’t know how much I regret it, I really do.”Stuart promised unconvincingly. 

“THAT WAS _ALL_ OF OUR SAVINGS!”Carol wept, screaming so violently it sounded like her vocal cords would snap. 

“… I’m sorry…”Was all Stuart could sob pathetically, audibly breaking down into his own puddle of tears and regret.

Laura turned away from the door and noticed Kevin staring at her with wide eyes.He had stopped playing and was now intently listening to his parents fight, but he was staring at Laura with helpless eyes as he searched her expression for signs of either panic or stability.His little Superman paper doll hung by one arm from his hand as it lay limply at his side.

“What movie do you want to watch?”Laura asked him excitedly, waddling her way around the kitchen counter to the main area of the living room.

“Toy Story.”Kevin answered numbly.

“I _love_ Toy Story!Who’s your favorite character?”Laura asked excitedly, and loudly, if only to alert her to friends how thin these walls were.

“BUZZ!”Kevin shouted with enthusiasm.At least he was smiling again.

“Buzz?!”Laura confirmed excitedly, “Buzz is my favorite too!”

“Yeah!” Kevin agreed.

Laura popped the VHS into the beaten up player and prayed the tape was already rewound.It was, so Laura pressed play quickly and turned the volume up real high.

On the other side of the door, Carol waited until she heard the familiar opening to Kevin’s favorite movie blaring loudly from the TV.

_‘You’re my favorite deputy!’ ‘You got a friend in me….’_

Carol slowly turned away from the door and took a few more steps towards her husband. 

“I wanna know what was goin’ through your dipshit head.”She growled nastily.Her muscles were aching from how tense she was.

“I don’t know.”Stuart shrugged defeatedly, refusing to meet her eyes as tears poured out of his. 

“No.”Carol scolded through gritted teeth.“I wanna know WHAT was going through YOUR STUPID FUCKING HEAD—”

“Carol…”

“—THAT MONEY WAS FOR OUR _SON!”_

Laura raised the volume on the TV again and got up once more.“I’m going to be right back, I need more water,” Laura announced her departure to Kevin, but the 4 year old was too engulfed in _Toy Story_ to even care that she was getting up. 

She didn’t care anymore: Laura walked right up to the hallway and leaned her head against the door.If anyone came out she could just lie and say she was on her way to the bathroom.She seemed to be doing that a lot these days, anyway.

Carol shook her head, glaring at her husband as he ran his hands through his hair anxiously and opened his stupid mouth again. 

“I thought it was a sure thing." He admitted pathetically.

Carol laughed at him cruelly in response. 

"IT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A SURE THING!” Stuart wailed in pathetic desperation. 

The fight was supposed to be fixed.There was no way his fighter were supposed to lose that match… until he did. 

Stuart wasn’t even that into sports, least of all boxing.He had just trusted the wrong gambling addict to give him bad advice, and casually lose him five-fucking- _thousand_ dollars like it was just a bad day that they could recover from tomorrow.He’d been promised that the fight was fixed, he’d been _promised_ that it was a sure thing…

Carol’s mouth twitched as she stammered words that hadn’t even left her mouth yet. 

She let out a dark and disbelieving chuckled and glared at him. “You’re an idiot.I’ve actually never met anybody more STUPID in my life.”

Stuart slammed his fist against the wall so loudly that it shook the walls and thundered in the room.

Laura jumped on the other side of the door. Her hand flew to the handle, only to realize that the door was locked. Carol couldn't hear the doorknob rattling over the startling volume of Stuart's voice. 

_"I AM TRYING, CAROL!"_ Stuart's shaking voice seemed to reverberate against the walls just as loudly as the impact that had made the fresh dent next to the bed frame. "I WAS TRYING TO PROVIDE FOR MY FAMILY, I'm not _'allowed_ ' to do what I do best—"

"You should have more life skills as a fully grown adult beyond just cooking meth _babe,"_ Carol whispered with a venomous hiss, in a volume that was barely audible, mouthing the words _'cooking meth'_ so that it could not be heard through the walls and travel the news back to Laura — revealing the one secret that she had kept from her best friend for the entire duration of her marriage. 

“I DON’T HAVE ANOTHER _JOB,_ OK? I'M _BREAKING MY BACK_ TRYING TO GET ONE, BUT NO MATTER HOW HARD I TRY—"

"Oh please, Stuart, you have not tried even _half_ as hard just _looking_ for a job, as I have had to work to try to keep a roof over our heads! Busting my ass, providing, feeding this family on _tips from the diner!!!"_

"—IF I CAN'T COOK, _WHAT ELSE_ WOULD YOU LIKE ME TO DO FOR QUICK MONEY, BABE?”

A stunned silence fell over Carol as she instinctively checked behind her to make sure Laura wasn’t somehow standing in their bedroom listening to the fight.

 _“Keep your voice down!”_ Carol hissed loudly, an obvious twinge of guilt and shame in her voice.

Laura furrowed her brows on the other side of the door.She wasn’t sure exactly what that meant, only that Carol didn’t want anyone else to hear. And although Laura had mostly forgotten, somewhere in the back of her mind she was well aware of Stuart's past dabbling in homegrown garage-experimentation. Incidentally, she hadn't put the pieces together yet, and she would remain in denial about the connection for years to come.

There were faint whisperings on the other side of the door, but Laura couldn’t make it out.

“We’ll talk about this later.”Carol flung open the door and locked eyes with Laura. 

Laura could see Stuart behind the open door, slumped over on the bed with his head hung low, looking defeated. 

Carol closed the door behind herself quickly, and stood mortified in front of her best friend.

“I was on my way to the bathroom,” Laura explained unconvincingly.

Carol stepped to the side and gestured for Laura to go ahead, unable to look her in the eye, unsure of how much of that she’d heard. 

Laura waddled her way past Carol and paused, bathroom door half closed.

“I needed to make sure he wasn’t going to hurt you…”Laura explained carefully, glancing at Carol briefly, before shutting the door and realizing just how much she really did need to use the bathroom after all.

Laura’s words pummeled Carol in the chest.Is that really who her best friend had thought she'd married? _Was_ that who she married?

The thought of Laura Tucker, 8 months pregnant, risking _everything_ just to barge into the room and break up one of Stuart and Carol’s famously explosive fights — endangering the wellbeing of the precious child that she had waited _so long_ to _finally_ carry in her body...

Carol shook her head and took in a sharp breath as she hastily wiped the heavy tear that had fallen down her cheek. 

By the time Laura had gotten out of the bathroom, Carol was sitting on the couch with Kevin, cradling him in her arms and watching Toy Story with her son as he sat on her lap and leaned lazily back against her chest. Stuart was still locked inside his bedroom, thinking about what he'd done. 

Laura walked over and sat down next to them. 

"Alright, ooh the birthday party scene, I love this part!" She nudged Kevin's dangling foot with her hand. 

Kevin nodded slowly, wide-eyed, like a zombie, focusing fully on the movie. 

Laura leaned closer and whispered quietly to her friend, "is everything alright?" 

Carol's face conveyed the misery she felt for only a second, before it was wiped away by a scarily convincing smile. "Yeah. Perfectly fine."

Carol turned back to the tv, giving her son a swift kiss on the top of his head before smoothing his hair back down lovingly.

"He looks more like Stuart every day." Laura commented softly, "but he's still got your eyes."

Carol responded by giving her son three more kisses on his soft brown hair. 

"His hair is a nicer color than mine." Carol joked, playing with the soft brown baby hairs that were already beginning to sprout with strands of rich chocolate brown, darkening from Stuart's mousy color every day that Kevin got older. Kevin chuckled with a childlike sweetness, before paying his attention back to his movie.

"I wonder how much he'll look like Thomas..." Laura murmured absently, touching a gentle hand to her round belly.

Carol smiled down at the baby bump, before a neutral and wondering expression replaced it. 

"Does it ever make you sad?" Carol muttered softly, "that he won't look like you?.. I mean, he'll probably pick up on your expressions... your signature glare," Carol nudged Laura gently with her shoulder. Both women laughed, and Laura demonstrated the very glare Carol was talking about, before rolling her eyes and smiling. "But, I mean... does he get any of your genes just being in there or... does it have to come from the egg?" Laura shrugged, she really didn't know. "Well... does that ever make you sad?" Carol asked gently. 

"No," Laura answered honestly, smiling, "I still get to carry him. And even if I didn't, I still get to hold him every day." Laura was beaming now, excitedly imagining the day this baby inside of her would be welcomed into the world and into her arms.

Kevin, who had begun listening at some point of the conversation was now staring at Laura's belly with an intrigued expression in his furrowed brows.

"There's a baby in there?" He asked aloud, tilting his head confusion.

"Yeah," Laura answered with a smile, "just like when you were a baby, and you were in your Mommy's tummy."

Kevin turned around in his mother's lap, and looked from her flat stomach to Laura's round one.

"How the baby get in there?" He asked, squinting his eyes in disbelief.

"Oh, babe, that's a question for another time." Carol chuckled, shutting down the conversation with a humored glance at Laura.

"Think you'll ever have another one?" Laura asked her friend with raised eyebrows. 

"God, no," Carol shook her head definitively, "at least not any time soon."

"Yes, soon." Kevin joked with a childish, mischievous grin.

"Oh, really?" Carol scoffed in surprise.

"Yes!" Kevin cheered. Carol was not even fully sure he knew what he was cheering for, just that it was the opposite of whatever Carol was advocating for. This kid sure loved to argue for the sake of it.

"No." Carol shook her head, speaking now to Laura instead of her son, "maybe in a few years... it would be nice for Kevin to have a sibling to play with but... no, we need a few more years first, there's no way."

Just then, the conversation was interrupted by the bedroom door opening, and Stuart emerged, pupils as wide as saucers.

"Baby," he sniffled with a shaking and apologetic voice, folding his hands in front of him so that his shoulders slumped around him (he looked like a dog with his tail between his legs), "can I talk to you for a minute?"

"No." Carol snapped at him.

Stuart threw his hands in the air and scoffed wordlessly a few times before sighing and trying again, "please?" He whined pathetically.

"FUCK, STUART, NO, GO BACK INSIDE! I can't even look at you right now..."

Stuart stared at his wife woundedly, mouth hanging open, before turning around and locking himself back up in the room once more. 

Carol met Laura's eyes with an exposed vulnerability in her expression. "He's not feeling well right now." Carol explained hurriedly, before turning back to the TV, foot tapping, and kissing her son once more on the top of his head. 

At around 5:30, Carol announced that she should probably make dinner, and Laura insisted that she help.

Laura got to work assembling the sandwiches, and Carol began chopping baby carrots into bite sized pieces for her son.

Laura laid slices of bread out onto a cutting board, repeatedly catching glimpses of her friend out of the corner of her eye as the two women continued working in heavy silence.

“Mustard for everyone?”Laura questioned, mainly just to get a conversation going.

“Mhm.” Carol hummed distractedly. 

Laura stared at Carol for a moment longer before resuming her work.

“Everything alright?”Laura murmured softly.

Both women looked up from their cooking to quickly check on Kevin in the other room.He was fully absorbed in his movie.

Carol pursed her lips, shaking her head as she went back to chopping carrots.“Some days I want a divorce.”

**\- October -**

It was Halloween, and the McCormick family had come back from trick-or-treating a few hours ago with a healthy stash of candy in a grocery paper bag for their 4 year old son. He had gone as Batman (in a homemade costume, which was really just his Batman t-shirt over a black long sleeved t-shirt, and a store bought cape — but Kevin didn't care, he was just happy that he got to be Batman. He even used the voice all day in preparation, which was absolutely adorable).

At 9:00 at night, Carol was standing in the kitchen, leaning thoughtfully against the counter and nursing a very hot cup of tea while Stuart finished putting their son to bed.

A few minutes later he emerged, smirking, and tiptoed straight towards the kitchen table. 

"I'm stealing a Reese's," Stuart giggled mischievously, chucking as he dug gingerly through his son's candy bag, "you want me to grab you anything while I'm in here—?"

"I'm pregnant." Carol blurted out, gracelessly. 

Stuart spun around on his heels, his expression blank. 

Carol just shrugged frustratedly.

Stuart's hand flew to his mouth, and Carol could see the wheels turning in his head as he was no doubt calculating how in the fuck they were going to scrape by while adding another kid in the mix.

Carol nodded her head. "Yeah. Pregnant." She repeated bluntly. 

Stuart's hand slowly left his mouth and revealed a tentative smile. 

"Ok." He chuckled musically, his hand flying to his mouth again, as if he was surprised at the sound. "Ok." He whispered, closing the space between him and Carol, kissing her on the cheek, and wrapping his arms around her in a warm embrace.

Carol stared at the opposite wall numbly as she raised her hands to rest them against his back.

"We'll make it work." Stuart mumbled soothingly in her ear, reading the worry in her body language before she could even voice it. 

Carol closed her eyes and held onto her husband tighter, as he gently rocked her on her feet.

A moment later, he pulled back to look in her eyes. 

"Another baby... this is exciting!" Stuart cheered, squeezing his wife's shoulders emphatically.

Carol chuckled and smiled weakly, until worry polluted her expression once more.

"Don't worry about it right now, honey, this is good news," Stuart insisted in a soothing voice, brushing her hair behind her ear and cupping her cheek lovingly, "a brand new miracle that God has given us... everything happens for a reason, maybe this baby will be just what we need to complete this family. We always said we wanted another eventually, right?" Carol nodded numbly, "Yeah! So he or she just came a little early, that's all. This is a _good thing,_ Baby. Kevin can have a little friend to play with; he'll have fun being the big brother, having the responsibility of someone to rely on him... it's going to be great. Maybe we'll go all out, get a little dog in the yard..." Stuart's gentle smile spread into a wide and playful grin. Carol chuckled under her breath and folded her arms, shaking her head with an entertained grin — her smile directed down at their sock-covered feet on the cold kitchen tiles. When she looked back up into Stuart's twinkling eyes, she could no longer bite back her smile. He always knew how to make Carol feel better. 

"I love you." Carol mouthed, barely whispering the sounds, as she stared up into Stuart's bright blue and beaming eyes.

Stuart looked down at her warm expression and grinned that lopsided smile that had never ceased to release butterflies fluttering in his wife's stomach. "I love you," he responded in his own shy whisper, then again — repeating the avowal once more in soft brushes against her lips before kissing her slowly and deliberately, stroking a gentle finger underneath her chin and brushing the tip of his tongue against hers delicately. Carol's knees almost buckled underneath her. 

Stuart leaned his forehead against hers lovingly, both smiling and giggling as they pulled each other close. 

Carol lay her head on Stuart's bare chest, listening to his heartbeat as he stroked her bare arms. Carol closed her eyes and imagined they were not on the couch of their dingy one room apartment, with the baby monitor resting on the coffee table, while their son slept on in the room soundly. No, in Carol's mind they were in a big mansion, with a hundred bedrooms, each one with a bed more comfortable than the last — a California King bed — in a room with a door and a lock.

"Another baby..." Stuart mumbled in quiet amazement under his breath. 

Carol opened her eyes. 

She sat up a little bit and looked at her husband's face. He smiled back at her, with a lazy droop in his eyelids and a lovesick smile on his face. 

Carol propped herself up on her elbow and turned to face him. Stuart shifted onto his side to better make room on this tiny couch, and the two lay there side by side, face to face, under the warmth of a thin knitted blanket. 

Carol grabbed a hold of Stuart's hands and intertwined his fingers with hers. Stuart snuggled in closer and smiled at her. Carol smiled back, until the gravity of reality settled between the fine lines in her young face. 

"What are we gonna do?" Carol whispered, eyes darting away from her husband's as they began to prickle with tears. 

Stuart brought Carol's hands to his lips and kissed her knuckles sweetly.

"I mean... Baby, I have a solution, you know I do..." Stuart tempted with an innocent lilt in his voice and a devilish gleam in his eye. 

Carol sat up quickly, scooting herself to the edge of the couch and scooping her t-shirt off of the floor. 

"Yeah." She responded flatly, pulling the fabric over her head harshly and refusing to look at her husband as she stood up to gather the rest of her clothes off the floor, "Just do it."

**\- April -**

A heavily pregnant Carol awoke from a mid-day nap to an incessant banging on her front door. 

Stuart wasn't home to answer the door, having taken Kevin to the park with Thomas and baby Craig (at the insistence of their wives that the two men start spending more time together getting to know one another). 

After the third consecutive bout of knocks, Carol realized she would have to answer it. 

She swung her swollen ankles over the edge of the bed and slid her sore feet into her fuzzy slippers (which seemed to be one of the few pairs of shoes that still fit her feet at the moment). Carol waddled her way to the front door and swung it open slowly, still groggy from her interrupted nap (which she really should have been taking today). 

"He's sellin' again?" Laura asked as she flew inside the apartment. 

Carol didn't even bother denying it, even as her eyes shot open wide with panic and shock. 

"Who told you?" She demanded to know. 

"Kevin." She told Carol with an accusatory eyebrow raise. 

Carol closed her eyes and furrowed her brow guiltily. 

"Yeah," Laura crossed her arms with an affirming scoff. 

"What?" Carol sighed in disbelief as she closed the front door. 

"Kevin." Laura repeated, taking a step towards her pregnant friend, "your four year old son told me he heard 'mommy' and 'daddy' fighting about 'moneys' and _'supplies',_ asking me if I know what that means; and telling me how 'sometimes Daddy goes away in the middle of the night and doesn't come back until the morning'. I'm not _stupid_ Carol, I know who he is! Don't forget I was there from the beginning—"

"Ok, _stop! Just stop!"_ Carol shouted, sinking into the nearby couch and covering her face with her hands. "Oh God," she took a few deep breaths, but she was beginning to hyperventilate, _"shit!"_ She began to cry. 

Laura's heart couldn't help but break for her pregnant best friend, who she had always had a soft spot for. 

"Ok, well you don't have to cry," Laura reasoned in a flat voice, rolling her eyes and sinking into the seat next to Carol. 

Carol took a shuddering breath in and out as she tried to calm down. 

"I'm so embarrassed," she whispered, wiping her eyes on the hem of her maternity dress. 

Laura clicked her tongue and rolled her eyes as she stood up to grab a paper towel square from the kitchen. 

"Here." She grunted flatly, but gently, as she thrust the towel in Carol's direction. 

Carol nodded in thanks and took the paper towel graciously. 

Laura sat back down next to Carol and waited silently and patiently as she tried to calm down. 

"How long have you known?" Carol whispered. 

"All of five minutes." Laura answered honestly, "the boys came back to the house for lunch. He said it while Kevin was in the bathroom and Thomas was changing Craig." Carol nodded her head absently. "So it's true?" Laura pressed. Carol nodded, eyes closed. 

The confirmation was more devastating than the assumption, and Laura felt like all the air had been sucked out of her lungs. 

"How long?" She asked with a small, shaking voice. 

"Since October," Carol answered honestly, pursing her lips as a tear fell between them. 

"How many times has he done this, Carol?!" She demanded to know.

"Once. A-a few!" Carol lied blatantly.

"Bullshit." Laura scoffed.

"Ok, he used to do it a lot when he was a teenager, but since we've been together he only did it before the first baby to help pay for him a little, and that's _it!"_

Carol wasn't completely sure why she was lying, she only knew that she couldn't stop herself. 

"It's incredibly dangerous, Carol. Especially with the kids around!" Laura yelled, "What if he brought bad people around here, around your kids—"

"Please don't talk about that..." Carol whispered breathlessly, dropping her head to her hands, feeling faint. 

Laura stopped in her tracks. She sunk against the back cushion of the couch slowly as Carol sniffled and cried into her hands silently. 

"Is he using?" Laura mumbled gently. 

"What?" Carol turned her head. 

"Is he using." Laura repeated herself more clearly. 

Carol jumped on the opportunity to tell the truth, for once (even if it was only a temporary one), "No." She sat up straight and shook her head, "no, Stuart is sellin' to some old friends again, but he's _only_ sellin'. He's _really_ trying to find an honest job, Laura, _honestly._ We just need a little extra money in the mean time and... well this is what he knows..." 

Carol felt sick, listening to herself make excuses for her husband, regarding the very skillset she'd cut him to pieces for over and over, many times before. 

Laura rolled her eyes. "Yeah well he better not be using, because you know employers can drug test at random times, and weed can show up on test results for longer than people think.... we are... talking about weed, aren't we?"

Carol held her breath. Her friend had just presented her with a way out. 

Laura knew of Stuart's past history with dabbling in other drugs, but she was unaware of the dependence; she had always assumed he was just an avid experimenter, and it was hard for Laura to comprehend a reality where her best friend's grown-ass husband would still do that shit with a kid and one on the way. Call it cognitive dissonance, but although she felt like she needed to clarify her suspicions just in case, the likelihood of any other possibility just seemed too far fetched to Laura to _actually_ be true, and the alternative only crossed her mind fleetingly. 

Carol blinked at her friend blankly. "Yes," she lied, "he don't do any hard shit any more. But weed is so easy to get and so easy to sell, it was just a way to make easy money, honey, I promise." 

Carol was lying through her teeth. Despite the fact that Stuart kept a little bit of weed in his bedside drawer, it was nowhere near enough to sell. She also conveniently left out the part about how not only was Stuart dealing in hard drugs again, but he was also cooking it with dangerous chemicals, in a new shady motel every week, and storing the supply in a corner unit at the storage garage, where the corrupt owner owed Stuart a favor or two from back in the day. 

Laura squinted her eyes at her friend as she debated whether or not she should even believe her. She had already lied to her so much, the trust was already broken. There was really no way to know what else could be false. Laura decided she had nothing else to do but trust that her friend had no reason to keep any further information from her, now that the truth had come out. 

"Ok," Laura's shoulders relaxed a little bit, learning that at least her friends were still sober, "but it's still really dangerous, Car, he could get caught, he could go to jail—" 

"It's just until we have enough extra money for the baby; just until we both have better jobs and then we won't need to anymore! It's a one time thing, Laura please don't tell anyone..." 

Laura pursed her lips and looked her friend up and down. "How much do you have saved up?"

Carol wiped her nose on the back of her hand. "A little, why?"

"This ends today." Laura commanded, "I'll lend you money if you need it but no more of this crap anymore."

"I'll talk to Stuart, Laura, _I promise."_ Carol nodded fervently. 

"You're done."

"We're done."

"Immediately."

"Immediately." Carol agreed wholeheartedly. 

Laura stared at her friend for a minute longer before saying, "you know this is a really shitty position you've put me in here, and it's really not fair," Carol dropped her gaze embarrassedly, and Laura continued as tears welled in her eyes, "there's really _no one right thing_ for me to do now, and it all seems like a trap. Every choice that I make from here on out comes with a consequence: whether I enable this behavior or get you help, whether I tell my husband or keep it from him... There's no one right answer for what _I_ should do with this information." 

Carol nodded. She could only pray that the answer would never involve uniformed professionals. 

"I'm sorry," she whispered, truthfully, "more than you know." 

"Yeah," Laura stood up and made her way to the door, "me too." 

It had now been an hour since Laura left, and Carol was still sitting on the couch, gripping the cushions with all of her might and staring off into the abyss hypnotically as tears poured from her strained expression. 

Her husband had still not come home yet, which means that Laura had not turned him away yet. Either that or they were having a talk... 

Carol blinked herself back to reality with a subtle gasp and looked around the room as her breathing quickened. 

She pulled herself up off of the couch and ran as fast as her condition would allow into the bedroom. 

She stumbled her way over to Stuart's bedside table, knocking over an empty plastic cup of water in her haste as she pulled open the drawer with great force. 

She dug around in there for just a second until she found what she was looking for: a crisp, white box of cigarettes. It wasn't exactly what she wanted, but under current circumstances it would have to do. 

"Sorry baby, Mommy needs just one," she said to herself out loud as her shaking fingers fished one out. The lighter clicked a few times before it actually lit, and Carol breathed in comfortably as the end of the cigarette softened with ash. She breathed out smoothly at first, coughing halfway through after realizing just how long it had been since she'd actually smoked one of these things.

It was then that she came to her senses.

 _"Oh."_ She gasped. 

Panic washed over Carol as she waddled to the bathroom as fast as she could.

Carol flung open the bathroom door and tossed the still-lit cigarette into the toilet and flushed. She watched it spin around dizzyingly in the bowl. 

It wasn't long before Carol sunk to her knees, overcome with nausea, and threw up almost instantly, before the cigarette had even fully flushed.

When she was finished, Carol stilled herself, breathing heavily as she attempted to steady her spinning head, and flushed again.

Carol broke down into sobs almost instantly, falling against the cold porcelain and leaning her head against her forearm.

"I'm sorry," she sobbed, placing a steady hand on her belly, "I'm sorry..." 

**\- June -**

"Mom. Mom!" 

"Kevin, not now!" 

Carol was dealing with a bored four year old and screaming one-month old, all why in the middle of cooking dinner for her family. 

She attempted to nurse Kenny, but that only worked for a few minutes until Carol just stopped trying. This baby tended to prefer to drink breast milk from a bottle only, which was very inconvenient, but at least the milk was still free. 

"Mom. Wanna color with me? Mom!"

"Not now Kevin," she grit through her teeth, stirring off-brand Chef Boyardee on the stove as her son lay screaming in her arms.

"Hey, family," Stuart announced himself cheerily as he walked in the door. 

"Are you high?" 

"No!" Stuart lied, pupils the size of his irises. 

"You are!" Carol accused, as Kevin continued to tug on her shirt hem.

"Mom!" 

Stuart shrugged wordlessly a little, "So I stopped by the storage unit on my way home from work..."

"Mom!" 

"When I needed you here. Clearly." Carol gestured around at the chaos ensuing in her kitchen. 

"Mom!" 

"Here," Carol gently thrust their newborn baby into her husband's arms. She had felt such a connection to Kevin right away when he was born, but this one just felt... different. 

The opposite could be said for Stuart. 

"Hey, baby," he cooed at the infant in his arms, "where's the bottle?" 

Carol pointed wordlessly at the table in front of him. She didn't have time to remind him to make sure that the top was screwed on before he picked it up by the nipple, knocking the bottle over and spilling valuable breast milk all over the table. 

"DAMMIT, STUART!" 

"Mom, wanna color with me?" 

Carol balled up some paper towels and threw it at her husband. 

"I'm holding a baby," he scoffed at her judgmentally as he pried the towel from where it landed softly on their son's face. 

"Mom!" 

Carol wordlessly flung open the fridge and assembled another bottle of breast milk, slamming the fridge door as she made her way over to the sink to run it under hot water. 

"Mom."

As Carol handed the newly prepared bottle to her husband, a horrible burning smell alerted her to the kitchen.

 _"No!"_ She whined exhaustedly, pulling the overcooked ravioli off of the stove and scraping the bottom, only to find burnt sauce stuck there. Carol poured the salvageable contents into some bowls, and examined the black goop at the bottom of the pot as she attempted to scrape at it with the wooden spoon. It would take forever to clean this, if she could even get it clean.

"Hey Mom." 

One can of ravioli was too small to split between three people as it is, let alone with some of it stuck possibly irreversibly to the bottom of one of the only nice items the McComrmick's owned—

"Mom. Mom!" 

Carol snatched the crayon out of Kevin's hand and broke it in half, throwing the broken pieces across the room. 

_"NO I DON'T WANT TO COLOR WITH YOU!"_ Carol screamed thunderously in her son's face. 

The room went quiet. 

Stuart and Kevin were shocked, and Kenny was happily eating his dinner from his bottle. 

Carol blinked as if coming out of a trance, realizing what she'd done. 

"Oh no, Kevin, sweetheart, I'm sorry," but it was too late — Kevin had already dissolved into pitiful wails and high pitched screams as tears poured down his red cheeks. 

Stuart stood from his chair, a completely shocked look on his face. 

Carol covered her mouth, looking from her husband to her son. 

"Kevin—" 

She reached for him comfortingly, but Kevin retracted from her in fear, screaming louder than before. 

"Why don't you go lay down inside, hon, I got this," Stuart offered softly. 

Carol looked around the room helplessly as her son continued to scream and cry, making direct eye contact with her. 

Carol watched as Stuart placed baby Kenny in his crib (which had been residing in the living room, since they'd begun to run out of space in the bedroom), and grabbed the pieces of crayon from the far side of the room. 

Carol remained frozen in place, tears silently streaming down her face as Stuart calmly fixed the crayon with tape and walked it over to Kevin, who was now balled up in the farthest corner of the room.

Stuart sunk down to his knees and presented the fixed crayon to their son, rubbing his shoulder and murmuring comforting sentiments of how 'Mommy didn't mean it' and 'Mommy is just very tired'. Kevin reached his little arms out and Stuart gave him a gentle hug. 

Carol's breath hitched as she stormed into the bedroom and slammed the door. 

On the other side, she slid to the floor and collapsed into sobs. 

Eventually, she stood on wobbly legs, before walking to the middle of the room and collapsing on the bed face-first, screaming piercingly into her pillow. 

Carol waited until both of her kids were fast asleep.

“I’m going to the store for a minute.”She announced, hearing the shake of anticipation in her voice.

Stuart looked over his shoulder at Carol, then over to the clock at the other end of the room. 

“Ok.”He answered, a slightly confused look on his face.“Is… everything ok?”

Carol shrugged lightheartedly and nodded her head.“Just need supplies.Might as well do it now while I have some alone time.”

Carol saw Stuart check the clock one more time before finally shaking his head and deciding that made at least a little bit of sense.

“Ok, well make it fast, the bus won’t be running no more in an hour.”Stuart turned back to the TV and took a sip from his beer can.

Her wide eyes glared at the back of her husband's head. 

“...Ok.”Carol agreed politely, smiling through gritted teeth, and stepped out the door.

Carol stood in the baby aisle, listening to the faint tinny buzz of music playing softly through the crappy quality loudspeakers.

A woman walked down the aisle with a shopping cart headed for the ensure, so Carol picked up a tub of baby formula and pretended to be meticulously checking the ingredients. 

Once the woman had left, Carol returned the tub to its place on the shelf and took a deep breath.

 _‘Am I really doing this.Am I really this weak?’_ Carol thought to herself, shifting her weight on her feet and flexing her fingers over and over again as she thought this through. 

It wasn’t a good idea, it _damn_ sure wasn’t a smart or responsible one…

Just then the burner phone buzzed. 

Carol pulled it out of her purse and flipped it open so fast she almost dropped it out of her trembling hands.

It was an address.

So it was settled.

But it also wasn’t too late to back out… 

Carol had called Stuart’s connect and asked if she could come over to his house and pay to smoke just a little bit of the supply they had given to him. _‘Think of it like I’m just a regular customer, only I need you to let me smoke it in your house.’_ She had pleaded with him over the phone not even an hour ago.

It was degrading.

He had literally made her beg.

She had made the call in the bathroom, with both the sink faucet on and the shower running, just in case Stuart could hear her. _‘I don’t know,’ he toyed with her through the phone, ‘I can’t afford to be givin’ out no friends-and-family discounts—’_

_‘I’ll pay full price.’Carol’s voice jumped out of her throat urgently._

_The other end of the line had gone silent.‘Hello?’Carol whispered desperately._

_‘Lemme think about it.’_

_Then the line clicked, and Carol was left with only the rush of water in one ear, and a lack of noise in the other._

_She’d lowered the phone, staring at her reflection as she did so.Her eyes were tired and her skin was pale and anemic looking. Carol fluffed up her dry and frizzy hair a little bit as a tear rolled down her cheek.She didn’t like it, but she had made her decision._

_She couldn’t look at herself anymore.Carol turned off the sink and leaned against it._

_She ran her head under the running shower before quickly turning it off.She stripped down, placing a towel around her body, and tucking the phone tightly in the middle of the pile of clothes in her hands.She caught one last tired glimpse of her reflection as she stepped out of the bathroom..._

Carol was pulled back to her florescent-lit reality by the sound of a baby crying. 

There was a woman pushing a stroller in the aisle with Carol.

The woman looked just as exhausted and ill-taken-care-of as Carol.She almost didn’t seem to notice that her baby was crying.She just let him wail and wail from his stroller seat while the woman trudged her way down the aisle like a zombie, grabbing miscellaneous baby items and throwing them into her shopping basket.

Carol couldn’t keep her widening eyes off of that screaming baby boy with blonde hair, like Kenny’s.

The screaming was getting louder and louder, and the stroller was slowly moving closer and closer to Carol.The sound was maddening, like an itch you need to scratch, but can’t reach.A mad tear rolled down Carol’s cheek and she wiped it away hastily with the back of her hand.

Eventually, with tears behind her closed eyes, Carol said fuck it, and grabbed the cheapest container of formula. 

“Just enough for two weeks,” she told herself as she stormed her way to the register. 

Carol wasn’t even completely sure if Kenny would drink anything besides breast milk.

Carol paid for her $15 purchase with the $100 bill she’d taken from their money drawer and shoved the change deep in her pocket as she walked out the door and in the opposite direction of their house.

“Just once.”She muttered to herself under her breath as she walked in the chilly night air.“I can only do this once.” 


	5. Kevin - 5 years old

**Kevin - 5**

“We were never supposed to deal, WE COOK, THAT’S WHAT WE DO! We _cook_ , then you sell it to your connect and that's _it..._ THERE’S GOOD MONEY IN COOKIN’!”

“THERE’S BETTER MONEY IN DEALIN’, PLUS WE GET FAVORS AROUND TOWN!USE YOUR FUCKING HEAD, STUPID.”

_“I DON’T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT WHAT YOU GET FOR FREE, STUART!”_

Carol and her husband were arguing in hushed tones with their 5 year old kid in the next room, watching their four month old.

Neither kid was planned, neither they were able to afford. 

Carol had not done laundry in weeks, recycling old outfits (changing out of work clothes as soon as she got home, in an effort to make the clothes she wears out in public last the longest) until she could no longer stand the smell. 

Kevin even got made fun of in preschool one day, by some snobby boys and girls who picked up on the fact that his clothes were dirty and smelly, and exactly the same as the outfit that he had worn the day before (Carol usually tried to rotate his clothes so that maybe the other kids wouldn’t notice, but that morning they were rushing so fast she just grabbed whatever was closest).Her poor baby came home crying that day (as much as he tried to sniffle quietly and hold in his tears like a big boy), and from that day on, Carol’s spent her nights staying up late after putting her boys to bed, hand washing Kevin’s clothes in the sink — sometimes until midnight or one in the morning — while her husband slept peacefully in the next room.

Even if they could afford to go every week, it was too much of a hassle to walk all the way down to the laundromat with a giant backpack filled with weeks worth of smelly laundry, along with a stroller, a bottle, juice, snacks, books, crayons, and diaper bag.The walk was only a few blocks away, but when you’re lugging enough materials for a weekend getaway, plus a fussy newborn and an even more rambunctious 5 year old, alone, while your husband was holed up in some crappy motel for the night, locked in a poorly ventilated bathroom, cookin’ and calling it steady work… Carol tried to leave the house as little as possible. 

But there were some days (like these) when she almost wished she could just drop everything and runaway, forever.Almost…

“Carol, baby, listen to me,” Stuart stepped closer to her and spoke quietly, rubbing his hands up and down her arms, “think about how set we would be if we just had a little dealin’ money… the diner don’t schedule you enough, and welfare alone don’t feed a growing family… we’re goin’ hungry four days a week just so that Kevin has a real lunch every day…” Carol checked over her shoulder to make sure that her oldest wasn’t listening — he’s a very smart boy, seemed to always know what was going on with the grown-ups, despite his very, very young age.“Carol,” Stuart stepped closer still, looking down at her with sad and desperate eyes, “aren’t you hungry?”

Carol’s stomach almost growled in response.Yes she was hungry.She was _always_ hungry.

And her husband had it worse.He often insisted that it can’t be good for baby Kenny (who was already a preemie), to breastfeed from her without Carol getting all the nutrients she requires.He often offered up half (or sometimes all) of his dinner to her more times than not. 

Sometimes the act was less selfless, and more convenient — if Stuart was feeling sick or just plain not hungry, spun out of his mind or at the tail end of a bad comedown —but sometimes she knew how hungry he was, and still he would insist.

Carol looked back at her kids.Kevin sat in front of the TV like a zombie — legs crossed on the couch, Puppy laying limply in his lap, blank stare, neck craned, mouth hanging open and drooling just slightly — and Kenny was sitting in his plush baby chair, kicking his little legs in front of him and staring at them with fascinated wide eyes, watching his little pajamaed feet go. 

Carol turned her gaze back to her husband.He was far skinnier than he ever used to be, and she could practically see his shoulder bones poking through his week-old t-shirt.

She took a deep breath, and spoke.

“Ok.”She agreed.Stuart’s face lit up as he sighed with relief, no doubt already purchasing new expensive items in his head with ‘all that dealin’ money’ that he promised was out there for them to take, if they would just take that leap of faith.


	6. Kevin - 5 1/2 years old

**Kevin - 5 1/2 years old**

The McCormick family had finally moved into a real house.

It was a small house, but it was a house; with a yard and a garage, and a bedroom for each of their children.

They had a car in the driveway, and toys in their boys’ rooms.Their fridge was fully stocked, and their sons had clean clothes to wear.A new tv was on its way from Best Buy, courtesy of Stuart’s employee discount. Their client base was branching out, and the young couple were getting more business than ever before. 

There was no denying it: so far, life as a dealer was pretty damn good.

Once they’d cut out the middleman, they were making twice what they used to make before — and that was on drug deals alone, never mind the fact that Carol and Stuart both had pretty good jobs that they were doing a pretty good job of showin’ up for. 

Life was good.

Carol and Stuart were standing in their garage, pacing excitedly, awaiting the arrival of their most expensive transaction yet.They were set to make a mint on this deal.

Stuart took a swig of beer and whooped excitedly. 

“If this goes well, and we keep doin’ this, we are set for _life_ baby!” 

Carol squealed excitedly and wrapped her arms around her husband’s neck.

The two of them were making out like teenagers, thrilled by the impending excitement of a successful sell.

A knock on the garage door made them jump and pulled them both back to reality.

Stuart checked the single security camera he had installed outside the garage and turned back to Carol excitedly.

“Buzz him in.”He joked.

Carol pushed the garage button.They waited with bated breath as the metal door creaked open and yellow light pooled underneath the door.

Before the door was even halfway open, a disheveled looking man with huge muscles and patchy facial hair ducked down and let himself inside with startling speed.

“Turn off that shit.”He grumbled as he stood to full (not very tall) height.Stuart and Carol looked at each other confusedly. _“The light!”_ The man explained with a shout.

Stuart furrowed his eyebrows confusedly, but shut off the outdoor lights anyway, despite the fact that it probably seemed more suspicious to be the only house in the neighborhood with its garage lights cut.

This guy was paranoid, and completely spun…

The guy sighed in relief, sniffing loudly through his nose.“Where are my manners?I’m Acid.”He laughed jovially as he introduced himself, looking between the tense couple in front of him expectantly before finally taking a seat and pulling a small Glock out from his back waistband. “No funny business,” his eyes burned into each of theirs individually.

The married couple shot each other a look: they might be in way over their heads with this guy…

Baby Kenny was sick with a stomach virus, and Kevin was supposed to be in charge of looking after him. 

He’d felt so important — big brother Kevin — when Mommy asked him to watch Kenny for a few minutes while his parents went in the garage. 

Kenny was coughing a little bit, so Kevin decided to get him some water, because that’s what his Mommy did for him when he was sick (which right now, he also was).Kevin put down Puppy on the side of the sink.

“Ok Kenny, comin’.”Kevin promised under his breath as he dragged the step stool over to the sink and held a small cup under the faucet. 

The water made the glass really heavy, so he spilled a little, but he was eventually able to fill it up, screw on the lid as best as he could, and turn off the faucet. 

Kevin stepped down from the hand painted stool that he and Mommy had decorated together, and walked over to his brother — pale faced in the little chair that he was buckled into while Mommy and Daddy were in the garage.

“Here, Kenny,”Kevin sniffled, wiped his runny nose on his bare arm, and handed the cup to Kenny with both hands, careful that he didn’t spill too much on his brother.Kenny’s little hands reached out and grabbed the cup as Kevin helped tip the sippy cup into his mouth. 

Kenny started coughing and choking on the water so Kevin pulled it away from him quickly. 

When Kenny caught his breath and realized something had been taken away from him (even if it was for his own good), he started crying — hiccuping and hyperventilating while Kevin attempted to hand the water back, despite Kenny being too upset to notice. 

Then Kenny got very quiet, and his skin paled with a greenish sort of tint. 

He hiccuped one more time and threw up all over himself and his carrier, just barely missing Kevin’s shirt and shoes. 

Kevin closed his eyes (willing himself not to throw up in response), and didn’t open them again until he felt confident that he could handle it.Kenny started whimpering and fussing, feeling the warm and thick vomit settling into his clothes and seeping through to his skin where it chilled against the air.

Kevin climbed onto the step stool and grabbed some paper towels (way more than he needed, but he had a hard time ripping them).

Kevin closed his eyes as he attempted to wipe the congealing vomit off of Kenny, who had touched it with his hands and therefore now had it all over his face, and in his hair as well. 

It was too much for Kevin to deal with on his own, so even though he was told not to, he went to the garage to go find Mommy. 

“Mommy?” 

Kevin turned the doorknob and in a split second, panic crashed like a wave through the dusty garage.

“The baby frowed up—” 

Acid stood up and cocked his gun, pointing it right in the pale little face of a boy who just needed to find his mom.

Kevin's sentence was cut short as he stepped on the other side of the door and noticed the deadly barrel of metal pointed shakily in his face, right between his eyes.He may be young, but he knew exactly what it was for. 

Stuart yelped and held his hands out in front of him as if taming a wild lion in its den, frozen in horrific fear, but ready to run at any second.

Carol screamed in reaction and jumped out of her seat, before she had to cover her mouth with a trembling hand and still her movements… the gun now pointed directly at her chest. 

“WHY DIDN’T YOU LOCK THE DAMN DOOR?”Acid screamed, gesturing towards Carol accusingly with his gun-free hand — shaking and startled, but also red in the face, and blinking like crazy. 

“Whoa, hey, listen man,” Stuart hoped his voice didn’t convey the crippling panic he felt as he tried to reason with the man who was now pointing a gun at his wife’s chest, “everything’s alright, just put the gun down…he’s our kid, it was an accident, it’s nobody’s fault… he-he probably doesn’t even know what he’s seeing, just _put the gun down!”_

The man ignored him, closing his eyes and rubbing his forehead as he shook his head back and forth.Carol and Stuart shot each other a look, and nodded in agreement. 

Stuart’s whole body tensed as he tried, as discreetly as possible, to reach his left arm behind him and grab the concealed gun that the McCormicks kept on the bottom shelf in the garage.

“It’s ok,” Carol reasoned calmly, trying to settle an already paranoid maniac, who was also high out of his mind, “it’s ok, he—he’s only a _child.”_ Her voice cracked, but her stance and her gaze remained strong.

“Mommy?”Kevin cried quietly.

“It’s ok, baby,” Carol assured breathlessly in Kevin’s direction, never taking her eyes off of the man with the gun, “Mommy’s ok…Look, Acid, it’s alright, you can put the gun down.”Carol’s fingers twitched at her sides, and her thighs started to tremble, contracted and ready to run towards her child at any moment. 

Stuart closed his eyes and prayed silently, moving his lips, as his outstretched fingertips brushed against cold metal. 

“……He’s seen something…” Acid replied in a wide-eyed trance, as he slowly turned the gun back on the child.He cocked it with a sickening click.

“No, no, no, no, no,” Carol chanted in a quiet, pleading panic, as she rushed towards her boy.

Kevin wailed in terror watching the horrible weapon being pointed between his eyes.

Stuart’s fingers curled around the shotgun, and his wedding ring hit the metal barrel with a soft click.

Acid spun around so fast that the gun actually fell right out of his hands and clattered to the floor loudly.A horrible clicking sound meant that the bullet was jammed in the chamber, but the gun had technically gone off — while it was pointed right at Stuart’s head.The garage stilled.Stuart wasted no time this time and lunged at the weapon.He swiped it towards himself carefully, holding it against the floor underneath his foot, and pointed towards the wall.The shotgun remained pointed steadily at Acid. 

Carol used this opportunity to scoop up her son and burst through the door into the house, with him in her arms, locking the door behind them. 

Carol set her crying son down and stood up, pacing the floor for just a second while she collected herself. 

Carol let heavy tears of relief plummet from her eyes as she sobbed quietly into her hand for all of 15 seconds. 

“Ok,” Carol whispered as she knelt down in front of her son, smoothing his hair and clothes down frantically as she sniffed her tears back and tried to smile, “you’re ok.”

“Mommy,” Kevin began crying louder now, both terrified — as the gravity of what had just happened in the garage finally hit him full force — and relieved that he no longer needed to be brave.

“It’s ok, you’re ok now,” Carol collected her horrified son up in her arms, swaying him back and forth as he stood, hands on her shoulders and sobbing, “I’m so sorry, baby, Kevin, I’m so, so sorry.”Carol couldn’t hold back a sob, and it rang out loudly against her son’s ear.Carol covered her mouth with her hand again and closed her eyes tightly, one hand still rubbing a circle around her baby’s shoulder as she rocked him on his feet. She could only pray this would be a memory he was too young to hold onto. 

“That was… s-scary…” Kevin hiccuped, calming down now with his mother’s arms around him, but still fearing what would happen if she ever let go. 

“I know baby, I’m so sorry, I’m so, so sorry…”Carol could not apologize enough. 

She wanted to stay here and comfort her son, wanted to lock herself and her boys in her bedroom and watch their favorite shows, all snuggled together in bed until maybe her eldest would finally forget what he saw. 

But she knew that could never happen.

A crashing sound from the garage pulled Carol’s attention back to the locked door. 

“Kevin.”Carol pulled back to look at her baby boy with as much of a brave face as she could muster, grabbing him by his little shoulders and looking him in the eyes, “You’re such a brave boy.”

“The baby frowed up,” Kevin recited, remembering why he had gone into the garage in the first place. 

Carol looked over her shoulder towards the garage and readjusted her stance anxiously. 

“Ok,” she reasoned, looking back to her son, “ok, I’ll deal with that when I come back, but I need you to _stay here._ Do you understand me?”Carol stared into her baby’s eyes pleadingly.

“You’re going back?”Kevin asked for clarification, his tone pleading with her not to go back in there as his eyes filled with tears.“No-o-o…” 

“Everything is going to be ok, Mommy is going to be ok, and so is Daddy,” Carol promised, smoothing down her son’s hair again in a soothing way.“But I need you to be my brave boy, ok?” Kevin’s expression numbed and his gaze started to drift.“No matter what you hear, you _do not_ come inside— look at me!”Carol cupped her son’s cheeks between her palms and stared at him sternly, “Promise me.”

“Why does Daddy have a gun too?”Kevin asked shakily, his sentence broken up by little sobbing breaths as he tried to stay brave.The image of his father pointing a big scary weapon at another man kept flashing behind his brain, distorting more and more each time until Kevin began worrying: was Daddy a scary man too?

Carol was about to console her son and promise him that Daddy was only trying to protect them when her attention was pulled back to the screaming argument in the garage.

“Look, baby, what you saw in there, you didn’t.Got it?”She pleaded roughly,“You cannot tell anyone, understand? _Kevin!”_ Carol shook her son lightly by the shoulders as his eyes began to drift away from her in a spacey expression.“You didn’t see anything, and you didn’t hear anything, understood?You were inside the whole time, and you need to forget anything otherwise.Tell me you understand!”

“I understand.”Kevin whispered, hiccuping in the middle of the word.

“You didn’t hear us, you didn’t see us, and you didn’t come inside.”Carol pressed.“Repeat it.”

“I didn’t hear, I didn’t see, and I didn’t come inside.”Kevin recited back.

“Good.”Carol praised.

“And if anyone asks, I was here the whole time.”Kevin parroted numbly. Carol was both impressed and extremely horrified at her little boy’s comprehension of the threatening situation. 

“Yes.” She praised, a sick twisting in the pit of her chest, “Mommy loves you.”

Kevin absently wondered who in the world would ask him such questions, and his imagination ran wild with monstrous possibilities.It was like having nightmares, but he was already awake.

Carol kissed her son on top of his head, grabbed the garage key from the hook on the wall, and ran to the garage to help her husband negotiate with the frazzled man. 

The lock snapped into place behind her, and Kevin jumped at the sound.

Kevin stood in the hallway watching the door for what felt like hours, but was actually just a few minutes.His little heart pounded in his chest as he tried to listen for the hushed tones of his parents voices through the thick door (at least now they were quieter, calmer, muffled sounds rather than the shouting and banging that had been going on earlier).

After a few more seconds, Kevin heard Kenny making little fussy noises from where he sat, covered in mostly dry throw up, in obvious discomfort in the kitchen. 

Kevin let out a shaky sigh and walked over to the step stool to grab more paper towels to clean up his brother as best as he could, while he waited to see if Mommy and Daddy would come back from the garage. 


	7. Kevin - 10 years old

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love this Craig cameo XD

**Kevin - 10**

“WE CAN’T DO THIS ANYMORE, STUART!IT’S TOO DANGEROUS!”

“Carol…”

_“A MAN WAS WONDERING THROUGH OUR HOUSE WITH OUR KIDS HOME!”_

_“It was just Rio, you know him, he’s cool.”_

_“I DON’T CARE IF HE’S COOL, STUART!”_

“I HANDLED IT, I KICKED HIM OUT!”

“OUR _DAUGHTER_ WAS ASLEEP ON THE COUCH!”

“Oh yeah and where were you?”

The indistinguishable sound of skin hitting skin indicated that Carol had just slapped her husband across the face. 

More rustling and shouting noises followed, but Kevin was so tired of hearing it that he decided to tune out the details.

“Wh—where’s M-mommy and Daddy?”A tiny, scared Karen struggled to ask Kevin, scrunching her little face as she tried to pronounce her ’s’ with two missing front baby teeth (she wasn’t supposed to lose them yet, but thanks to poor adult supervision while Kevin was at school, she had).

“Who cares!”Kenny declared boldly, before going back to making his toy fly around the room, accompanied with whooshing airplane noises.It was his favorite toy: a dark blue action figure that Kevin had swiped from the day care toy bin at church.It’s not like it belonged to any one specific kid, and the adults would never notice if one dirty and paint-chipped second-hand toy was missing.Plus the bin was practically overflowing with thousands of other toys, no one would ever know he'd taken it for his brother.Kevin didn’t even know the name of this outdated superhero with the faded chest emblem that could no longer be read, so he called him ‘Mystery Man’, which Kenny just shortened to ‘Mystery’. 

“Mommy and Daddy?”Karen asked again, stomping her foot, upset that she wasn’t being heard.

She knew damn well where Carol and Stuart were.You could hear them up to a four mile radius.

Glass shattered in the hallway and Kevin instinctively shot his arms out to protect his siblings.

“Why don’t we go on a trip?”Kevin asked, trying to make his voice sound as excited as possible.

“A trip?”Karen asked, scrunching her face as she struggled to pronounce the ’t’.

“Like a vacation?”Kenny asked, confused.

“Mm… more like a _Secret Mission.”_ Kevin whispered, trying to make it seem exiting.

“A _SECRET_ _MISSION?!!”_ Kenny screamed at the top of his lungs.

 _“Shh!!_ Yes, but it has to be a _quiet_ secret mission ok?”

Kenny nodded nobly and held up a thumbs up.

“Ok, step one: pack.You're gonna be gone overnight for this secret mission.”

Kevin got to work packing Kenny and Karen an overnight bag, including Mystery Man and Karen’s little princess doll — the only item from Carol’s former and privileged life that was never traded or pawned, because it wasn’t worth a damn penny.It used to be their Mom’s, and now it was Karen’s.Kevin tried not to feel bitter about the fact that he never got anything comforting like that to sleep with at night…

Kenny waved his arms around to get Kevin's attention, and then began pantomiming what had to be the worst charades Kevin had ever seen. 

"What?... I don't get it... I can't...Kenny, I can't understand you, just fucking speak clearly already—!"

“Is it cold outside?”Kenny asked, loudly. 

Oh right, they’d need jackets…

“...Stay here.” 

Kevin snuck out into the hallway, and tried to be as quiet as possible, grabbing jackets and scarves for himself and the kids.

He dressed Karen in her green and purple jacket and wrapped a pink scarf around her neck and head.

“I can do it myself.”Kenny promised, struggling to zip up his orange parka.

“Give it to me.”Kevin shoved Kenny’s hands out of the way, ignoring his huffy protests, and zipped up the orange parka.He didn’t have time to think about the fact that Kenny was also wearing orange track pants, and he kind of looked ridiculous.Whatever, it didn’t matter, and Kenny thought he looked cool in his favorite color, so…

Kevin popped up the orange hood and wrapped a big gray scarf around Kenny’s neck, making sure to wrap it up around Kenny’s big mouth, in case he said anything too loudly and alerted their parents to them leaving.

Kevin slung the bag over his shoulder and picked up Karen in his arms.He grabbed onto Kenny’s hand, checked that his parents’ bedroom door was still closed down the hallway, and took off running. 

He’d left a little note just in case, not that he thought his parents were likely to check on the kids tonight. 

Kevin ran down the street and turned the corner, slowing down to a labored stroll when they were finally out of viewing distance from the house. 

“Are we going to Aunt Laura’s?”Kenny asked curiously, voice muffled thanks to Kevin's thorough scarf-wrapping.

Kevin thought about the last time he’d run away with the kids.Karen and Ruby were happy to see each other, and Laura was happy to see all of them, but Thomas was _not_ happy with three new mouths to feed, no matter how much he tried to hide it and be polite in front of them.Kevin could just _see_ these kinds of things.Kevin knew when he wasn’t wanted. For him, it was safest to just assume that was most of the time.

“Nah, I don’t wanna bother them again… What about Ike & Kyle’s?”

Kenny cheered loudly, and Kevin had to remind him to be quiet. 

“Ike, Ike, Ike, Ike…” Karen chanted repeatedly, Kevin wasn’t sure if it was because she was excited to see him, or because she liked the ‘k’ sound in his name.

The kids preferred to go to this house.And Sheila and Gerald were always much more welcoming than Thomas was.Plus the walk was shorter, and Karen was beginning to feel heavy in Kevin’s arms. 

When they finally got to the house, Kevin rang the doorbell. 

“One minute!”Sheila’s voice sang politely on the other side.Her face fell when she opened the door (this was not the first time Kevin had shown up unannounced…)“Is everything alright?”She asked him quietly. 

Kevin shook his head flatly and put Karen down on the ground.“Go play.”He encouraged the kids.

“Kyyyyyyle!”Kenny screamed behind his scarf as he ran inside the home rambunctiously.

“Kennyyyy!”You could hear Kyle’s distant voice, muffled with a mouthful of food.It was dinnertime.Good, that means they would eat something. 

“Come on in, sweet girl!”Sheila invited Karen in, who would never dare barge into a house uninvited the way Kenny just did.Sheila held out her hand for Karen to hold while she stepped over the threshold, but Karen continued to cling on once inside the house as well, standing next to Mrs. Broflovski closely and waiting patiently for her to walk with the toddler to the table.Mrs. Broflovski held out her other hand welcomingly.“Come on in Kevin, we were just sitting down to dinner.”

Kevin’s stomach growled at the mention of dinner, but he hoped Mrs. Broflovski didn’t hear it.He stared out her outstretched hand.“N-no, it’s ok, really.”Kevin pulled his arms inward against his body so that he didn't feel the warmth emanating from the house.“I should get back before they realize we’ve all gone…” He pointed over his shoulder towards the general direction of his house. 

“No!No, I insist!It’s sloppy joe’s!”Sheila attempted in vain.It was a warm invitation, but they both know that had never been enough to convince Kevin before. Kenny was Kyle's friend, and Karen was Ike's; Kevin was simply a burden.

Sheila’s smile faltered, and a pitying sadness overcame her eyes as she continued to to attempt to invite Kevin inside, "Come in, please."

Sheila didn’t look like Kevin's mom.She looked… motherly.Kevin was almost tempted to run into her arms and give in to his almost constant urge to cry over nothing in particular.His eyes widened as he blinked back tears that hadn't even pooled yet.

Kevin’s eyes flickered towards inside the house, where the kids were all sitting down to the table, and Kenny was bouncing up and down in his seat and announcing ‘sloppy jooooooes’ in his super hero voice, excitedly. It made Kevin smile just for just a second before his stomach growled again. 

Kevin rocked back on his heels, almost ready to take a step inside... but he didn't. Kevin can't explain what was holding him back as he slowly rolled back onto the balls of his feet. He turned back to Sheila. 

“No… there won’t be enough…”. Kevin insisted with a sad whisper.

“There’s more than enough.”Shiela promised. _“Please,”_ she gestured her outstretched hand back inside her house, and held her other hand out for Kevin to take, "I won't take no for an answer."Kevin wrung his hands nervously, but his feet remained rooted.“Well, if you won’t eat with us, will you at least stay over?”Shiela insisted.“We’ve got plenty of sleeping bags, or else the couch is very comfortable if you’re not comfortable on the floor of one of the kids’ rooms…”

“No, really, it’s ok.”Kevin laughed nervously, shoving his hands in his pockets and beginning to turn around.

“Kevin, please, I insist.” She called after him desperately.But the look on Shiela’s face said that she knew she couldn’t get Kevin to stay.He never had before.

“Thank you for watching them, Mrs. Broflovski.”

And that was it.Kevin took off down the sidewalk biting his cheek in the bitter cold.Part of him really wanted to stay with his siblings, but he knew he needed to stay home to check on his parents.If his Mom felt like ‘taking the kids and leaving’ to make a statement again, at least she would have one kid there, and not be looking for them all over town.

Kevin lay down in his bed and tried to fall asleep, despite it still being very early.It was no use though.Even after double checking that the front and garage doors were locked, even after shoving towels under his bedroom door to dampen the noise and pushing his nightstand in the way as a barricade (should anyone attempt to come in once he’d finally let his guard down), Kevin could still not relax enough to gently fall asleep.

He could not believe his parents were still going at it, fighting over how much money they made when it was just two kids, and how much worse it was to take care of three. It was exhausting to listen to, and quite frankly, Kevin was sick of this shit. 

His stomach growled again, and after deciding that there was no way he was going to be able to get any sleep tonight with all that fighting, Kevin packed a bag of his own, bundled himself up, left another note, and walked himself to the Tucker house.

Thomas answered the door, probably wanting to tell off whoever rang his doorbell just past dinnertime.

“Can I speak to Laura please?”Kevin tried to sound as politely as possible. 

“Uh, yeah.Sure, come in.”Thomas grumbled: the Tucker version of politeness.“I’ll go get her.And Craig is _not_ to leave the table.”Thomas spoke sternly to his son before marching off towards the master bedroom. 

Kevin slunk down into a seat next to Craig and leaned back in his chair. 

“What’re you in for?”He asked flatly.

“I’m in trouble because I won’t finish my peas." The little Tucker boy deadpanned in a comically nasally voice.  "Peas are gross.”

“Yeah.They kinda are.”Kevin agreed, slumping forward onto the table to rest his tired head.He could feel Craig continuing to stare at him from the seat next to him.The almost-6-year-old slumped forward in his seat to match Kevin and continued rambling.

“…I told my dad ‘no’.He said, he said to eat my peas... and I said ‘No way’.”Craig bragged to Kevin, proud at his little act of defiance. 

“Nice. You should totally flip him off next time.Like this.”Kevin demonstrated.

“Why?”Craig wondered, a mischievous smile growing on his face.

“It’s offensive.”Kevin explained, much to Craig’s delight.Craig swiveled around in his seat and happily flipped off every inanimate object in the kitchen — the clock, the plant, the stuffed guinea pig in the seat next to him — biting his lower lip for concentration as he put as much force into it as he possibly could.“Cool, dude.”Kevin chuckled.Craig turned and smiled at him, happily flipping him off as well.“Yeah, ok,” Kevin covered Craig’s little fist with his hand, “But, don’t tell your parents I showed you that, ok?Tell them you learned it from… kids at school.” 

Craig nodded, blushing shyly.

“Hi Kevin, is everything ok?”Laura emerged from her bedroom in mismatched pajamas, soaking wet hair, and a welcoming smile stretched across her face.

Kevin wasn’t sure what to tell her.“Um… well…”

“Craig go to your room.”Laura ordered.

“But I haven’t finished my peas.”The boy droned robotically.

“Tonight you don’t have to.Go tell Dad to get you ready for bed.”Laura pointed towards the hallway and raised her eyebrows. 

“Sweeet!” Craig cheered and jumped out of his seat.

“Where are the other kids?”Laura asked in a whisper.

“They’re at the Broflovski’s.”Kevin responded.

Down the hall, they heard muffled voices talking to one another.“Craig, did you eat your vegetables?… Don’t ignore me, I— _Hey!Where did you learn that?”_

 _“Kids at school!”_ Craig screamed mischievously before slamming his bedroom door and giggling loudly.

Thomas walked into the kitchen in a huff.“Our son just flipped me off.”He grumbled folding his arms. 

Kevin tried to hide his amused smile.

“Wonder where he learned that.”Laura raised her eyebrows at Thomas comically. 

Thomas rolled his eyes and flipped off his wife, but there was no malice behind the crude action.She chuckled at him as he bent down to give her a kiss on the head.“Goodnight you guys.”He called over his shoulder.

“Goodnight, honey!”Laura responded.

“Goodnight.”Kevin grumbled awkwardly. 

“So what happened.”Laura turned back towards Kevin.

“Nothing, just… fightin’ again…” Kevin wrung his hands together as he debated whether or not to just go home again and not bother everybody. 

Laura frowned at the news.“Do you want me to go over there?”

“No!God no.”Kevin pleaded, mostly for her sake.He was not completely sure what state his parents were in right now, but he had a few good guesses…

Laura’s frown deepened.

“Do you wanna stay here tonight?”She offered warmly.Kevin nodded in small, quick movements, eyes trained on the table.“Have you eaten anything?”He shook his head.Laura immediately stood up from her chair and began making Kevin a plate of that night's leftovers.He was so hungry at this point that he was nauseous, and the smell of food was almost torturous until a heaping plate was finally placed in front of him. 

Kevin immediately began scarfing down food like he hadn’t eaten in days.Sometimes that was true, but this time it had only been a few hours.

“Do you want me to call your mom and let her know you’re here?” 

Kevin shook his head and spoke with his mouth full, “No.Don’t want to risk them coming to other people’s houses in the middle of the night to get us back home.I just wanna sleep, I’m not in the mood to be a fucking pawn in their games tonight… sorry” Kevin apologized for cursing.

“Pawn, huh?”Laura brought Kevin a glass of water and sat back down next to him, “do they do that a lot?” Kevin nodded.“...Honey, why did you leave tonight?”Kevin stopped eating as Laura’s tone changed.“I mean… were you unsafe?Are _they_ ok? Is _she..._ ok?”Kevin swallowed heavily and tried to ignore the knowing worry in Laura’s eyes. He didn't know why Aunt Laura even bothered to care about his mother anymore. He knew even less why she didn't have the just to fucking ask her herself. 

“They was just fightin’.”Kevin shrugged.“I didn’t want the kids to hear it, and when I got back home from dropping them off, I was sick of hearing it too, so…” Kevin took another couple heaping bites of food and dropped his eyes to his plate.

Laura folded her arms on the table.“Don’t forget you’re one of ‘the kids’ too.” 

Kevin paused. He nodded his head gruffly and pushed down the tightness he could feel creeping up his throat.

Laura made up the couch for Kevin to sleep on and hugged him goodnight.He thought she had already walked back to her room when her voice pierced the silence.

“You’d tell me if anything was seriously wrong, wouldn’t you?”

Kevin turned around to face her.

He shrugged. 

Laura hugged herself and shifted her weight.“I know it’s a lot, and I hate to ask that of you, you’re just a kid… but honestly, Kevin, honey, you’re the most adult person in that house right now, so as much as it is _not_ your job, I’m gonna need you to promise me.”

“Ok.”Kevin agreed flatly. 

“You can always call me, and you won’t get in trouble. Understand?”

“Why do you still put up with us?”Kevin interrupted.Laura looked taken aback.“I mean seriously, wouldn’t it just be easier to forget you were ever friends with… my parents?” Kevin decided to forgo the descriptor he wanted to give, which was ‘fucked up pieces of shit’.

Laura took a step back and held her hand over her mouth.

“Honey,” she choked, rushing over to the couch to sit down next to the slouching boy with the dark expression on his face.Laura cleared her throat and spoke.“You don’t understand, you guys are _family_ to me, whether we like it or not.Always have been.Your mother and I have been through _everything_ together, for _decades,_ and I love her _so much.”_ A sobbing breath escaped, and Aunt Laura cleared her throat before continuing, blinking her tears away. “Even when she refuses to tell me what's going on, and _refuses_ to let me help her in any way..." Laura rolled her eyes and shook her head. (Kevin was not happy to learn the news that his parents were turning away help). "And I'm not completely blameless either." She uttered shamefully, "No matter how much I want to laugh with her again, or invite her out to lunch like the old days... it's not always the same, _something's_ different... I _know_ its selfish but some days seeing her so hopeless after loving who she _used_ to be is just _too hard.”_ Aunt Laura’s voice broke down to a whisper. Kevin wasn't sure exactly how much she knew beyond his mother's obvious bouts of depression, his father's history with drug usage, and his parents' rollercoaster relationship — but he had to assume she knew way fuck less than he did. He didn't think she would let it continue if she knew the whole story... “... But even if I _wanted_ to just break ties, however painful that would be for me, what really keeps me around… is you kids.”

Kevin stared back at her as Laura grinned at him with tear-filled eyes. She reached up a motherly hand and smoothed down the wild hairs in the back of his head. Kevin closed his eyes against the touch.When he opened his eyes again, a tear had spilled down his cheek silently.“You know I was there when you were born.I was even there when your mother first found out she was pregnant with you.”

“You were?”Kevin chuckled amusedly, wiping his cheek on his shoulder discreetly.

“I was yeah.”Laura nodded and smiled, dropping her hand.“You were such a sweet baby… you know what you’re first word was?”

“‘Laura’?”Kevin guessed flatly.

She laughed weightlessly.“No, ‘puppy’.”She corrected.“Do you remember puppy?”

“I remember, ‘Puppy', Aunt Laura, I’m not that old.”Kevin scoffed, humorously.

She laughed lightly, “I remember I bought you that stuffed puppy _while_ you were being born at the hospital.”She ran another hand down the back of his head, 

“I remember it.It was a beanie baby.I was so sad when I lost it.”Kevin reminisced on a childhood toy.

 _‘Lost’,_ Laura knew damn well that Stuart had pawned that toy once he found out that original ‘90s beanie babies were actually worth something in the early 2000s.

Laura's expression grew serious, “I will always protect you kids…” She vowed. 

Kevin felt his guard rising reflexively.“We’re fine.”He lied, gruffly.

“But you’d call me if you weren’t?You, Karen, or Kenny?... Your Mom?”

Kevin's brows furrowed. 

He’d spent a lot of his young life in high stress, always worried that any day now one of his parents’ friends will have had enough, and finally call CPS to take them out of their home.He’d been scared of losing his house, his belongings, and most importantly his siblings.Around 8 years old the idea of being swept away from this hellhole began to sound somewhat like a fairy tale.By 9, he realized if it hadn’t happened by now, it probably never would.

Laura was staring at him, a pleading look in her eyes, waiting for an answer. 

Finally he nodded. 

“Promise me.”Laura begged desperately,“If you _need_ me, you’ll _call.Promise…”_

Kevin looked back and forth between her eyes, tellingly.

“I promise.”

Laura bid him goodnight, and promised that he could wake her for any reason if he needed anything at all. 

Kevin thanked her, double checked that the front door was locked, and climbed into his temporary bed.


	8. Kevin - 13 years old

**Kevin - 13**

Kevin was sitting at the kitchen table, while his siblings played next to him on the living room floor. Their mother was screaming and crying in the next room, while his father sat across from Kevin, glaring at him dangerously. 

He had finally done it. 

Carol and Stuart’s drug use had gotten so bad that they were actually forgetting to feed the kids, or wake them for school, or even remind them to brush their teeth before bed. 

This was posing no problems for 9 year old Kenny (who would rather stay up all night without a bedtime anyway), but Kevin had had enough of parenting siblings who were 4 & 1/2 and 6 & 1/2 years younger than him.

He was tired of sharing a can of soup between the three of them, just because it was the only thing he knew how to make.

He was tired of walking from the middle school to the elementary school every afternoon, just to make sure his siblings were actually picked up.

He was tired of putting the kids to bed, checking the locks on the doors, and then checking on his parents to make sure nobody had OD’d on whatever homemade concoction they had cooked up this week to sell. 

He had finally called Laura and he told her _e v e r y t h i n g._

She was horrified, and demanded he put Carol on the phone right away. 

Kevin gladly sauntered into the bedroom and threw the phone at his mother, watching her scramble to hide the bottle of tequila she had out on her bedside table and struggle to sit up quickly, already drunk at 3pm.He saw a dirty, burned pipe in the drawer before she slammed it shut. 

She’d been on the phone, weeping and wailing for over an hour now, while Kevin and his siblings just sat there and listened.Her defensive guttural shrieks pierced through the walls and sent chills crawling up Kevin's spine.She deserved it. _Her husband_ deserved it.And now Kevin was being punished for snitching on his own family. 

Whatever, they both fucking deserved it. 

Carol wailed, a horrible, primal scream that seeped between the cracks in the walls as Laura confessed everything she knew: the dirty little secret that was supposed to be kept from their decades-strong friendship _forever._ The worst part was that she hadn't really known. Kevin had no idea how that was possible. She had known that her friend was going through a rough time again and that she was once again growing secretive and reclusive, but she had never suspected the extent of the damage being done in this house. 

Stuart’s burning stare intensified in response to his wife’s pain as Kevin continued to stare back at him blankly.

“I hope you’re proud of yourself.”Stuart spat disgustedly. 

Kevin nodded.“I am.”

Before he could even fully get the words out, Stuart had slammed his boy’s head against the table, and held him there by his neck like an untrained dog who had taken a giant piss on the carpet.

Karen began to cry loudly, making eye contact with her big brother, as he struggled under his father’s intense hold. 

“Come on, Karen, look at me!”Kenny waved his hands around excitedly, trying to draw her attention back towards him, “Woohoo!Let’s play something fun!Do you wanna see a magic trick?”

“I wanna play dress up.”Karen mumbled distractedly, eyes still glued to her father’s reddening face and her brother’s rough efforts to break free of his trembling hold.

“Ok!Dress up!Ok!Let’s play that in your room!”Kenny cheered, overly-excitedly, grabbing Karen’s hand and ushering her out of the room quickly.He glared pointedly at his father on his way out, but Stuart hadn’t seen it. 

“Princesses?”Karen asked quietly when they were halfway down the hall.

“…Okay.”Kenny agreed tentatively.Kevin tried not to smile at the image of Kenny squeezing into one of Karen’s elastic Halloween tutus and donning a plastic crown.She may even make him wear the feather boa…

Kevin nearly fell out of his seat when Stuart finally released his grip on him, throwing Kevin out of his hands like he was a cockroach not worth touching.The young teen grabbed onto the table for support as his chair rocked sideways from the force of being thrown by a fully grown man.

Kevin glared at his father hatefully as he rubbed the back of his neck. 

“Ugh.Just take me to Kyle’s house again, this _suuuucks,”_ Kenny whined from the middle seat of the back of their parents’ car.

“I wanna go to Ruby’s!”Karen demanded from her car seat.She was supposed to be old enough for a booster seat, according to Carol, but little Karen wasn’t physically big enough for that yet.

“You’re both gonna go to Ruby’s.”Kevin shut it down quickly. 

After the blowup had subsided, Carol had emerged from her room, tears dried and face puffy, and calmly announced to Kevin and Stuart that the kids were going to stay with Laura for a little while… a month or two, most likely, possibly the whole summer.Carol had promised that she and Stuart would attend AA as well as NA (a stipulation that Stuart had rolled his eyes at).She’d convinced Laura that they would detox here, at home, though Laura would be checking in on them daily — if not multiple times a day — and if she felt they were not succeeding on their own, she would personally pay for them to be admitted into a rehab center for detox. 10 days (Stuart began to protest this point, but the look on Carol’s face shut him up immediately.It’s not like they were legally employed anywhere at the moment anyway, so they really had nothing stopping them, aside from Stuart’s damn pride).Carol instructed Kevin to get the kids all packed, and wait for her in the car.

So here they were.

“Goin’ to Ruby’s.”Karen cheered quietly to herself at the news that she was getting her way. 

“Ew!With Craig?!”Kenny whined again. 

“Yes, with Craig.”Kevin barked 

“He’s booooring.” Kenny whined, leaning his chin on his palms, thankfully muffling his annoying protests.

“Too fucking bad.” Kevin declared. 

Kenny sat up straightly in rigid protest, “But Craig doesn’t like to play outside or watch TV! He likes _coloring_ and _puzzles!”_ He spat disgustedly.

“I like puzzles.”Karen murmured to herself absently.

“Why don’t you guys make music?”Kevin offered dryly.“You took music lessons together right?” 

The subject was always something that made Kevin’s stomach burn with jealousy.He’d never gotten music lessons like Kenny, or dress up clothes like Karen.He’d gotten nothin’.And now he was too old.

“Yeah, but I only liked going for Grandma, not for Craig.”Kenny scoffed. 

Kevin’s head whipped around to face his brother.

“Grandma?”

Kenny closed his mouth like he said something he wasn’t supposed to say. 

“You’ve met Grandma?”Kevin whispered breathlessly.

Suddenly the driver’s side door opened and Carol stepped in. 

She sat down quietly and buckled her seatbelt, holding onto the wheel without starting the car. 

“… Is Dad coming?”Kevin asked worriedly.

“No, he’s not coming.”Carol answered softly.The young teen felt his muscles relax at least a little bit.

Kevin continued to stare at his mother's profile as she wrung her hands along the wheel nervously. 

After a moment of tense silence, Carol turned halfway around in her seat and spoke to Kevin quietly over her shoulder. 

“I don’t blame you, sweetheart.I know you had to do it… I—I don’t blame you.”She repeated calmly, before facing front again and starting the car. 


	9. Kevin - 15 years old

**Kevin - 15**

It was around 10 pm when there came a knock on the door of the McCormick house.

No, not a knock, a bang.Three loud, consecutive bangs at the McCormick front door. 

Carol’s stomach dropped as she walked out of her bedroom — with bathrobe wrapped tightly around her — to find red and blue flashing lights tinting the living room walls, floor to ceiling. A harsh glow glared blindingly from the tiny kitchen window that directly faces the driveway. 

“No.”She whispered breathlessly, frozen in her tracks, and too frightened to move. 

She would have said that her heart was pounding in her chest, but really it felt more like it had just stopped beating altogether.

Another loud banging shook the wooden door in its frame.

“Just a minute!”Carol’s voice rattled out of her throat.

She was the only one home.Her husband was out drinking with his buddies, and there were cops banging down her door.

The two of them had stopped selling a couple years back, but they were still in possession of a hearty pile of homemade shit that they'd cooked and stashed away haphazardly in Stuart's bedside drawer. 

Carol thought about the promise he’d made to her back when Kevin was a baby…

She looked back towards her children’s bedrooms and silently prayed that they would not have to see her cuffed and driven away. 

Another reverberating knock.

“M-my-my husband will be with you shortly.”She lied, her voice sounded thin and panicked. 

“I’m here about Kevin McCormick.”The voice bellowed on the other side. 

Carol stilled.She let out a panicked, audible breath and ran to the front door as fast as she could, swinging it open widely. 

On the other side stood a cop, an incriminatingly conspicuous police vehicle with blaring, flashing lights, and her son — looking dirty and tired, holding a stuffed backpack in front of him in both of his hands, his shoulders slumped, and his eyes cast down. 

Carol quickly ushered him inside, and the cop let go of Kevin’s shoulder. 

“I got a call from Mall security about a boy sleeping in a car in the parking lot.Off first street. That's considered private property.”Carol turned around to glare at her son.“Do you recognize this vehicle?”

The cop handed Carol a written ticket that matched the description of the beat up old truck that Stuart and Carol had bought for Kevin on his birthday from an old friend who owed Stuart a favor, for a very good price.They had saved up a little bit here and there to surprise him for about a year to pay for it.

It was a similar price to the one she was looking at in her hands right now. 

Carol turned around to glare at her son.Kevin turned his head away from her ashamedly.

“Now, I decided to let him off with a warning, just this once, seeing as he’s a minor, and I figured he was just a runaway.Once he’d confirmed that it was safe to drive him home I brought him here.”The cop explained militantly.Really he had just taken pity on the kid, seen a lot of himself in those scared eyes and dirty cheeks.“But I would move the car as fast as possible.You don’t want other patrolling officers to think it’s abandoned, or else you may be noticing a few colorful pieces of paper tucked under the windshield.” 

Carol sighed exhaustedly, “I’m sorry about this, officer…”

“Barbrady,” the man tipped his hat and smiled happily for the first time since this encounter had began.He then pulled against his name tag, proudly stretching it out in front of him so that his shirt untucked and stuck out awkwardly on one side.Officer Barbrady looked down, noticed his one billowing shirt tail, and briskly tucked it under his belted waist apologetically.

“Now don’t make me regret giving you a warning, kid. I don’t want to see you getting yourself into trouble again, got it?”

Kevin glared back at the officer disrespectfully.Carol held her breath — well aware how a person with power can yield it like a weapon and strike when they felt undermined or attacked. 

Officer Barbrady was not offended, however.Looking at Kevin was like looking in both a time machine and a mirror. For a second, he could have sworn he was looking back at his own teenage self — jaded, purposeless, lost, and angry. 

Officer Barbrady nodded, before turning to Carol and speaking softly, “I would have a talk with your son if I were you.Kids don’t run away because nothin’s wrong.” 

Carol stared up into his invasively insistent expression and straightened her back. 

“Goodnight, Officer Barbrady.”She dismissed coldly.

He nodded with solemn understanding and began to walk towards his patrol car. 

She was about to close the door when politeness urged her to speak again, “And thank you.. for going easy on him…sir…” her voice withered down to a whisper — gratefully, but timidly — afraid that if she moved too quickly or spoke too loudly, that he may just change his mind about the McCormick family, and their most troublesome child.

Instead, Barbrady just smiled a charmingly boyish smile and tipped his hat respectfully, announcing proudly “I just like to help, ma’am.” 

Carol could have cried as she watched the baby-faced cop with wrinkles around his eyes wave goodbye to her and her son, before he walked back towards the driveway.

“And move that car!”He called over his shoulder as he opened the door to his patrol car.Barbrady gave a small wave before stepping in the drivers side and shutting off the lights. 

Carol waited until he’d pulled out of the driveway and driven halfway down the block before she closed the door. 

Then she turned to face her son.

Kevin was standing in front of the couch, clutching the handle of his backpack tightly in both of his fists — the way a child might hold a heavy bag in his small hands. 

Carol crossed the room and stood before him, straight faced and stoic.

Kevin shifted uncomfortably as his mother stopped in her tracks, with a few feet still between them, arms folded, staring him down with an unreadable expression.

She was furious with him.Furious that he had run away, and furious that he had made her worry about him — checking his bed multiple times a night, sometimes even leaving water on the nightstand, just in case, despite the fact that it had always remained untouched the following morning… but she was also relieved, _incredibly_ relieved that her baby had finally come home.He was safe and unharmed, and that was all that really mattered. 

But it still didn’t change the fact that Carol was blindingly furious with him… 

Kevin was never a mushy kid; he’d never climbed into his parents’ laps past the age of four, never asked for comfort from a nightmare past the age of six… he rarely even hugged his parents goodnight, and some nights he didn’t even see them before he went to bed. 

But Kevin had been gone for twelve days, and each one had become more lonely than the last.Even though he’d started out rotating houses, he was unable to keep sleeping on friends’ couches after a couple of days without their parents growing suspicious... and he feared what his father might do to him if he were ever returned home by another kid’s ‘concerned parent’.

So he lived in his car for six consecutive days, growing colder and hungrier every hour he was out there. 

He hadn’t felt like showing up to school unshowered, so he didn’t.He didn’t feel like staying sober, so he hadn’t.Kevin was lucky he had either sold or smoked the last of his weed by the time officer Barbrady had found him.

When he thought about the family that he had left behind, he first thought about his siblings — wracked with guilt over leaving them behind.

He next thought about his father, and the various possible punishments he may have to endure if and when he ever dragged his ass back home. 

But the person he thought of the most was his mother.Did she miss him?Did she even _notice?_ Had she called the police or just trusted that her son would come home one day?Did she ever lose hope?Did she ever _have_ any hope in the first place…

Even as he lay in the back seat of his beat up truck, covered in layers of jackets yet still freezing, his thoughts were not occupied with how cold he was, or who’s friend’s house he would pretend to be invited over to for dinner to the next day, but with how much he missed his mother.Kevin never thought he’d see the day when _that_ became a conscious thought in his fucked up head…

Tears filled his eyes as he looked at her — he was still a boy, after all, not yet _completely_ hardened by life, as he maybe should have been by this point. He took a plodding step forward, dragging his feet along the carpet before taking a few running steps and wrapping his arms around her, falling against his mother.

He wept onto her shoulder, snot and drool pouring out of him in an ugly display as he mumbled apologies over and over again in between sobs. 

Carol stumbled under the weight of her son, but she held her ground.It was breaking her heart to hear his voice wail and crack, and to feel his slumped shoulders trembling — both shivering subtly from the perpetual chill of a malnourished boy with nowhere warm to sleep, and shaking violently from erratic spasms generated from a body racked with sobs.

Carol squeezed her eyes shut tightly.Her heart twisted in her chest as her son’s pain became her own.Carol lifted her hands and placed them on her son’s shoulders. 

Slowly she pushed his skinny frame off of her, and dropped her hands. 

She didn’t look at him as she demanded in a detached voice, “Go wait in the car.”

Kevin stood shocked for a second, before nodding his head and obediently walking (almost running) out the front door. 

Carol held her composure until her son’s back was turned, and she was sure that he could not see her bitter tears.

The ride to the parking lot was a nightmare — unbearably quiet between them, with the radio blaring loudly in an attempt to occupy Carol’s mind so that she wasn’t tempted to scream until her throat bled. 

She was furious, but she wasn’t about to give her son the satisfaction of seeing her break.

When they finally got back to the house again and pulled into the driveway, Kevin’s heart sunk. 

He braked quickly in the driveway, only halfway out of the road.Carol got out of her car and slammed the door.She stormed over to the truck’s driver’s side window as fast as she could and knocked.

“What are you doing?”She demanded to know.

“…Nothing.” Kevin mumbled apologetically.He tore his gaze away from the kitchen window — where he could clearly see Dad washing dishes at the sink — and shifted the car back into drive to pull it up the rest of the driveway.

Carol exhaled the breath she didn’t realize she was holding as the truck engine cut off and her son stepped out of the driver’s side. 

She could see him glance worriedly at the kitchen window as he fidgeted with the keys in his hands. 

Carol reached forward and snatched the keys from him (just in case).

Kevin almost jumped as the loud clamor pierced the still night air.His fingers stung just slightly where his house key had sliced dully across his frozen hand. His mother kept treating him like a mental patient, or an inmate — like he was just _bound_ to mess up again if she didn’t keep a close enough eye on him.But then again, he did definitely deserve it.

Carol followed her son’s nervous gaze to the kitchen window. 

Kevin's eyes dropped to his numb fingers as he wrung them together, distracting himself from the guilty tears brewing deep beneath his hardened expression.

A meager sigh brought Kevin’s attention back to his mother.

“I’ll talk to him.”She offered, softly. 

It was the first nice thing she had done for him since he’d come back home. 

Her son looked back at her with a rare childlike expression that she had not seen on that face in a long, long time. 

Kevin nodded in understanding — grateful, but also worried.He could feel his blood pressure rising as his mother turned the door handle and stepped inside the house. 

“Hey, Babe—” Kevin heard his father greet his mother, before hearing Stuart stop in his tracks.

Kevin didn’t even give Stuart the time to react to his son’s presence, and made a b-line straight for his bedroom.

Kevin left his door cracked open a bit.He could hear some hushed whispering in the kitchen from his mother, followed by insensitively cold responses from his father: “He was gone?Hm, I didn’t notice.”Carol scolded her husband in hushed whispers, but Kevin had already decided he didn’t want to listen anymore.

He closed the door softly, and went to bed.

The next day, anytime Kevin ran into Stuart in the hallway, he was given the silent treatment.He may as well have not even come back.

It wasn’t until dinner time, that Stuart finally spoke up and addressed his son.

“Things were better with you gone.”Stuart informed flatly. 

Kevin looked up, wide-eyed: this man hasn’t spoken to his son all day, and _that_ is what he chooses to lead with?

Carol glared at her husband and kicked him under the table. He didn't react. 

Stuart shoveled more food in his mouth and elaborated, “It was quieter, more peaceful,” then with a cold, dismissive gesture around the room.“I think your siblings can attest to that.”

Kevin argued through clenched teeth, whole body triggered by a deep instinctual betrayal, “No.”

“Yeah.”Stuart nodded belligerently, like it was just a _fact._

“Dad,” Kenny scolded softly, but Kevin wasn’t sure if that was meant to mean he disagreed, or that he’d just been ratted out…

Kevin grit his teeth and balled his fists under the table.“That’s not true,” he argued through clenched teeth.

Stuart laughed mockingly.

Sure, ok, Kevin fought with his parent and siblings a lot, but the most explosive fights were with his dad.He can’t deny that there have been times that he’d woken up the whole house with all the screaming and running around.Karen would cry, or Kenny would attempt to get in the middle and help, only to then become the newest target until one day Kenny just stopped even acknowledging the existence of turmoil. 

Kevin couldn’t deny it, but he would still never admit it.

The boy glared at his father threateningly and muttered with a cruel smile, “I think you’re thinking of when _you’re_ gone.”

Kevin ducked instinctively, just in time as a plastic dinner plate was thrown right at his head.It clattered against the wall behind him and fell to the floor, smearing processed cheese and hamburger helper against the walls as it slid down and settled against the baseboards, threatening to stain the dirty floor below.

“YOU UNGRATEFUL PIECE OF SHIT” Stuart scrambled out of his seat and over to his eldest son.

Kevin jumped out of his chair and stood to his full height, looking down at his father (from the 3 or so inches that didn’t really separate them all too much). 

“You think you could have had it better on your own?”Stuart snarled up at him. 

“Is that a joke?”Kevin scoffed, before screaming, “We _ALL_ would have been better off growing up anywhere other than this _shithole!”_

Kenny and Karen shot each other a look.

Carol felt nauseated, unbearable guilt churning in her gut.

“Well, if you hate it here so much, why don’t you just leave for good? Go on! You have my blessing.”Stuart offered with sarcastic politeness.

“Stuart,” Carol rose from her seat warningly.

Kevin made a conscious decision to cut his father where it hurts, “Because someone has to help Mom take care of your children, _Dad.”_

Kevin’s snarling response was met with invalidating laughter from his father, which only served to hurt Kevin more. 

“When are you even home to _‘take care of them’?"_ Stuart chuckled, throwing up air quotes, which only further made Kevin furious.

“When are you?”The teen uttered through a clenched jaw, fists shaking.

“Oh please,” Stuart dismissed. 

“No, Dad, when are you?”Kevin reiterated, louder this time.

“Watch it.”Stuart warned.

“You have a problem.”Kevin shook his head judgmentally. 

Stuart’s eye twitched as he responded, “If I had a fucking problem the state would’ve taken my kids by now, but oh look, you're all still here with me.” 

Kevin’s memory flashed back to a time when that was almost the case; when he and his siblings moved in with Aunt Laura while his parents were getting sober, and they had no idea how long they were going to get to stay, or where they would be sent to after they'd left.They all cried the day they had to go back home.

“Maybe we should've gone to the state!”Kevin bellowed.

Karen looked to her other brother, anxiety skyrocketing, but he just shook his blonde head definitively.Kenny wouldn’t let that happen.She was sure of it.

“Kevin,” Carol tried to calm him down, masking the deep hurt in her voice. 

“I would have called CPS a _long_ time ago, if it didn’t mean that _I COULD LOSE THEM TOO!”_ Kevin bellowed at the top of his lungs until his voice cracked.He was visibly shaking, hard, as tears filled his eyes and flowed like currents past his trembling lips.He made an involuntary whimpering sound and covered his mouth.He tried to breathe normally, but his tight chest heaved and hiccuped against his will. He doubled over and grabbed onto the chair for support as a burning ache in his gut spread throughout his body.

The sound of Kevin’s sobbing thundered in his family’s eardrums. 

Stuart backed away in horror as his son began to break down in front of him.He spun around to look at his wife helplessly, then back to Kevin.Stuart reached out to his son, but he retracted just short of resting comforting hand on his shoulder, sighed apologetically, and retreated shamefully to his bedroom.

“Come on, why don’t you both go eat in Kenny’s room?”Carol suggested gently, as quietly as she could, ushering a shocked Karen and Kenny out of the room with a gentle tap on their backs. 

Kevin was completely covering his face now — embarrassed, and also unable to calm down.

Carol walked towards him silently.Towards her son, who had suffered more than enough in his young life. 

_“Mom,”_ he whimpered pleadingly.

Carol pulled her son close to her and wrapped her arms around him tightly.

Kevin began crying harder, until the pain and desperation became almost unbearable.But he held on, and eventually the ache in his chest dissolved into warmth the longer he realized his mother was not going to let go.

Carol sniffled and wiped her tears on the back of her hand.“I’m sorry,” she whispered, rocking him back and forth as she held her son,“if I ever made you feel _unsafe…_ or _unloved,”_ Kevin wept audibly, and held on tighter to his mother.

Her sweet boy had grown stoic and cold, and independent to a fault — to the point where she had always just _assumed_ that whatever life would throw at him, Kevin would always be ok.She never knew… all this time, all these years of worry and pain... he had kept it to himself and she had failed to recognize when he needed her.She hadn’t even realized how much her teenage son had still needed her until today…

"It's ok." She promised. Her voice broke and fell into a whisper the second time as she repeated, "it's ok."

Kevin’s breath shuddered as he began to calm down.

He pulled away from her and blew tight air out of his mouth as he prepared to speak calmly. 

“I’m sorry I ran away.”He choked out, getting himself worked up once more and sobbing uncontrollably all over again. 

Carol did her best to calm him down.It was breaking her heart.

She shushed him quietly, tipping her gaze up to the ceiling as she wept quietly, “you’re home, now.”

Karen and Kenny ate in what was mostly silence.Kenny had his CD player quietly playing an album by some boy band, but they didn’t talk much. 

Eventually Karen spoke up.“Things _were_ better with Kevin gone…”

Kenny didn’t disagree right away, but after a pause he reasoned, “I think that has more to do with Dad and less to do with Kevin…”

Karen raised her eyebrows, and turned her attention back to picking up as many cheesy-beefy-macaroni noddles onto one forkful as she possibly could. 

When she just couldn’t keep quiet anymore, Karen let her fork drop against her plate and inquired, coldly:

“Why do we have to pretend that we don’t hate Kevin?"

Kenny swallowed his bite quickly, almost choking on it.“I don’t hate Kevin.”He responded firmly, honestly.It was the truth.Although Kenny was often annoyed by and/or stressed out by his older brother, he definitely didn’t _hate_ Kevin.“Do… you hate Kevin?” Kenny asked quietly, just in case the eldest McCormick was able to hear them through the doors.

Karen shrugged.Kenny’s stomach dropped and it made him feel sick.Kenny paused the music.

“Karen, you need to take that back, I’m serious.”

“Why?”Karen furrowed her eyebrows.

“Because _our brother_ doesn’t deserve that.”He explained in a firm whisper, checking the door for any signs of movement in the hall.

“I mean… doesn’t he?” Karen asked genuinely, “he left us.”Kenny lowered his gaze.He couldn’t deny that wasn’t true.He was angry with Kevin too, but Karen seemed hurt by his desertion. “He did a shitty thing, and we're just supposed to forgive him because he's in the kitchen crying about how sorry he is for doing the shitty thing?" Kenny could only shrug. She did have a point. He didn't even bother scolding her for swearing. It _was_ a shitty thing Kevin did. Karen continued, "I mean I know he’s family, but that's all he is. You're my brother too, but you _act_ like it. That's the difference. I wouldn't choose him if I had a choice." Kenny's heart broke as Karen confessed her deeply honest feelings about their brother, with him just in the other room, falling apart. She shrugged and spoke delicately, "Why do I have to pretend that Kevin was ever a good brother to me?”

Memories flashed before Kenny's eyes of his big brother pushing him down, laughing as he fell, and making fun of him as he tattled to Mom.

But then there were memories of his big brother feeding him while his parents were gone, or him making up creative games for them to play when they were bored; of Kenny scraping his knee and Kevin making sure he was patched up and feeling all better; or Kenny sick in bed, and Kevin bringing him water and crackers; Kevin taking the fall _any_ time Kenny got into serious trouble, or sticking up for Kenny no matter who he had to fight with to do it.

When their parents were in their dark phases, strung out and clashing like natural disasters whose hurricanes roared through the narrow halls, Kevin would take his siblings somewhere safe; or he would let them all have a sleepover in his room — where he’d slide furniture in front of the door for his siblings' piece of mind while he stayed up all night, on guard, just in case.

Kevin used to do all that stuff.There just came a day eventually when he just… stopped doing any of it.

Kenny thought about what his sister had said: _'why do I have to pretend that Kevin was ever a good brother to me?'_

“Because he used to be..." Kenny smiled sadly at the distant memory, "Once upon a time.”Kenny set his plate on his bedside table, “I just don’t think you remember, anymore…”

It was the middle of the night and Carol woke up, her eyes drawn to a thin strip of light faintly outlining her door.

Fearing that her son could be planning another escape, she jumped out of bed and stepped gingerly into the pool of light illuminating the hallway.

Carol rounded the corner and saw Kevin.

He was in the kitchen, picking up his father’s dinner plate off of the floor.He quickly sunk to his knees with a rag in one hand and a multi-purpose cleaner in the other, scrubbing at the stained wall and floor vigorously, breath still shuddering and sniffling as he worked.

“He’s a good kid.”

Carol turned around at the sound of her husband’s voice.

He had tears in his downcast eyes as he pursed his trembling lips.He looked back up at her and smiled tightly.

With a gentle hand on her shoulder, Stuart passed her, and walked straight up to Kevin.

Carol watched on as Stuart sunk down to Kevin’s level and spoke softly, placing one strong hand on his shoulder before picking up the rag and working with Kevin to repair what had been damaged.


	10. Kevin - 16 years old

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you know, you know.  
> I almost didn't add this story in because it was already briefly described in the big AU fic, but I felt like I needed to see this healing moment between Kevin and his siblings, especially after that tiny moment with his father at the end of the last chapter.  
> I also needed Karen to experience Kevin being a good brother to her past an age where she was old enough to actually remember it.   
> To be clear, these kind of moments never fix anything (it would take a lot of therapy to fix this family), instead they just make things more complicated when inevitable darkness returns.

**Kevin - 16**

Today was kind of a hard day for Kevin. 

It was technically the first day of school in their district.Only, Kevin had already dropped out. He'd officially withdrawn over the summer, but he hadn't told his parents yet...

So instead it was the day he was laying at home, doing nothing with his life, while everybody else enjoyed seeing friends again, and talking about what they did over the summer.Kevin had never liked or respected the structure of school, but today he did feel like he was missing out.

That’s why, at 3:45 in the afternoon, he was already blacked out, passed out on his couch, in the middle of a day-rager that he’d thrown in an effort to numb away gnawing feelings of regret and embarrassment.

He was so fucked up by the time Kenny and Karen had come home from school, that he was completely unconscious among the small group of delinquents and friends who had stopped by to get obliterated with Kevin on a school day.

Kenny walked up to someone giving a home tattoo of a flower on a pretty girl’s ankle.He was using a real needle gun and everything! 

“Cool.”The preteen noted, nodding his head in appreciation in an attempt to look cool in front of this older girl.

“Thanks, little man.”The tattoo artist praised, slurring just slightly.Despite being a little bit fucked up, he seemed to be doing a great job.“Alright!All done!”He declared.The girl looked down at her ankle and gushed about how beautiful a job he’d done.It really looked professional…

“Can I get a tattoo?”Kenny asked excitedly.

The older man only laughed at him, “Maybe when you’re older.”

“Then can I try it?”Kenny counter-offered.

The tattoo artist guffawed, “what, you think I’m gonna let some kid I don't know practice tattooing on me or something?”

“Not you,” Kenny grinned, “Kevin.”

The older man laughed hysterically, already handing the needle gun to the 12 year old.

Kenny worked painstakingly, but quickly, watching his brother’s eyes for every twitch and wince, praying he didn’t wake up too soon.

Just as he was about to finish the exclamation point, Kevin startled awake.

“Dude!”He shouted, noticing the permanent ink on his arm and feeling the pain simultaneously.“What the fuck?!”He questioned, eyes shifting between Kenny and the tattoo artist, who were both howling like hyenas.Karen chuckled quietly next to them.

“What, this is my early birthday present to you, you don’t want it?”Kenny chuckled.

“No I don’t want your shitty tattoo! Oh my God, what the fuck, is this actually real?”Kevin whined, really hoping this was some kind of prank.

“I’m not even finished yet!”Kenny protested as Kevin grabbed the tattoo gun out of his brother’s hand.

“LOOK AT MY ARM!”Kevin hollered, sitting up and staring down at his inked skin in disbelief. ‘Kenny was here’ was staring back up at him.“I LOOK LIKE A FUCKING SCHOOL DESK!” 

Kenny was snickering to himself at the success of his very permanent prank.

“I still need to finish the exclamation mark!” He argued with a giggle.

“No, you’re done!” Kevin barked.“Devon, put this shit away, everybody go home!” 

“But I was supposed to go next.”Karen pouted.

Kevin looked over at his little sister.

"No." He argued, unconvincingly. 

"Come on, please?" Kenny whined on behalf of his sister. 

Kevin sat there on the couch, watching with growing amusement as both of his siblings talked over each other, protesting the silencing of their art and negotiating the terms which would convince Kevin to allow them to finish. 

By the end of their collective spiel, he couldn't help but smile. 

Aw shit. 

The looks on his siblings' faces grew more excited by the second, as they realized Kevin's usual reserve was beginning to melt away.

Kevin shook his head and chuckled.

“Fuck it."

For the next hour and 15 minutes, Kevin sat really still while Kenny finished his exclamation mark (more like stabbed the final dot into his muscle like an EpiPen), and Karen scrawled with painstaking cursive the _slowest_ and most _excruciating_ tattoo Kevin had ever gotten. Everybody at the party had left, but the four of them barely noticed. 

“Dude that is gonna scar.”The tattoo artist, Devon, commented with a chuckle as Karen scratched the needle across her brother's skin as meticulously as possible, pressing down tightly in an effort to make sure she didn't mess up.

“I know.”Kevin grunted, trying his best not to let his sister know how much it hurt.

When it was done, the tattoo artist let the two new budding artists apply cling wrap to Kevin's brand new tattoo, really make it official. 

"Beautiful." Kenny commented when it was finished, accenting his approval with a little chef's kiss. 

"Is mine straight?" Karen wondered out loud, surveying her work closely and squinting her eyes as she drew nearer to the writing. 

"Too late now," Kevin pointed out. He winced as he struggled to sheath his tender arm through the sleeve of his sweatshirt, chuckling at the ridiculous source of his pain. 

"We should really do this more often, that was fun." Kenny insisted with a wide smirk.

"Oh I'm sure for you it was." Kevin rolled his eyes. "Next time it'll be your skin."

"Really?!" Kenny clasped his hands together excitedly. 

"No." Kevin scoffed humorously, amused that Kenny had actually believed him. 

"No, but I—" The rest of Kenny's sentence was silenced by the pillow Kevin had thrown at his face.

"Are Mom and Dad home? I'm hungry." Karen interrupted her brothers' childish argument. 

"I don't think so." Kevin looked around him, fully aware that probably, they were not — which meant that nobody had gone shopping, and there was still only butter in the fridge. 

"Pizza...pizza...pizza...PIZZA...PIZZA...PIZZA... _PIZZA!"_ Kenny began chanting under his breath, until it grew to an annoying volume. Kevin covered his brother's mouth with his hand as Kenny continued to demand pizza through muffled screams.

"Do _you_ have money for pizza?" Kevin snarled agitatedly at his brother.

"I do!" Kenny's muffled voice piped up excitedly from behind Kevin's hand. 

Kenny proceeded to whip out a small pile of $5 bills. 

"Where did you get that?" Karen and Kevin asked in unison, with matching confusion. 

"Cartman said he'd pay me $5 to eat a spider, and then a bunch of other kids kept paying me to eat a bunch more stuff." 

Kevin and Karen now shared matching expressions of horror and disgust. 

"Don't be doin' shit like that." Kevin scolded. 

Kenny shrugged. "Pizza?" He asked excitedly, holding the wad of 5's in front of Kevin's face. 

Kevin rolled his eyes and sauntered over wordlessly to grab his keys from the hook on the wall. 

His siblings cheered excitedly. 

"I'll drive!" Karen blurted out as the McCormicks bid goodbye to the tattoo artist in the driveway and closed the door to the empty house. 

Kevin wordlessly shot her a look. 

"But I called it!" She argued. 

The kids ate their pizza happily in their favorite restaurant. One they rarely were afforded the luxury of visiting. 

It was moments like these when the McCormick kids could momentarily relax: take a deep breath, let their guard down, and pretend to be a normal family. 


	11. Kevin - 18 years old

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Last one.  
> Hope you guys enjoyed this deeper look at the McCormick family dynamic for my High School AU.

**Kevin - 18**

“Kevin… KEVIN!” 

Kevin woke up to his brother slapping him awake, in the midst of a dying day-ger.

“You were supposed to pick us up from school.”He scolded, eyeing Kevin’s sloppy hair and stained clothes disgustedly. 

“Sorry.”Kevin shrugged, looking up at him from where he lay stretched across their couch. 

“Karen is sick, she was _not_ supposed to walk in the cold.”Kenny snarled at his brother. 

Karen wiped her nose on her sleeve and glared daggers at her older brother. 

“Oh… my bad.”Kevin sniffled.A sketchy looking dude in a cut-sleeved flannel bumped into Karen, and Kenny instantly held her close to him, protectively. 

“Who are all these people?”Kenny whispered, looking around the room with repulsion written all over his face. 

Kevin shrugged wordlessly, adjusting his head against the pillow. 

“Do you even know them?”Karen scoffed, flatly.

“Friend of a friend.”Kevin grunted, as if that explained the ten or so strangers wandering around their living room.

“They’re eating our food!”Kenny whined, noticing a guy happily chomping down on a ham sandwich near the kitchen. 

“Hey!No food!”Kevin called lazily, pointing towards the kitchen with a limp hand. 

“This is fucking disgusting.”Kenny folded his arms in that ‘holier than thou’ way he had, “get these people out of here.”

“They’ll leave.”Was all Kevin said, draping his forearm across his eyes to dull his pounding headache. 

He hadn’t seen Kenny punch him in the stomach, he’d only felt it.

“Come on Karen.”He heard him mutter, before the middle McCormick crouched down, growling straight into his big brother’s ear, “you’re just like Dad.”

Kevin didn’t open his eyes again until he’d heard the front door slam. 

He lay still against the couch for a moment longer, listening to the music drone on in a mellow beat as he felt a herd of strangers shuffle around the living room around him. 

Slowly, he sat up and took in his surroundings.Beer, booze, and bud lay strewn about the coffee table.Someone’s pipe lay buried in the carpet, but he didn’t know whose it was.He didn’t even know half of these people’s names.Most were just friends of his Dad’s.

All of Kevin’s friends had left him, moved on to the next party, and left him passed out on the couch with fucked up strangers who were all too drunk or high to realize it was time to leave the house.Kevin would get them out.These people probably didn’t even know they’d been partying with high schoolers… well… some high schoolers and one high school dropout…

Kevin grabbed a bottle of label-less-whatever-the-fuck off of the table and took a swig.The motion of tipping his head back rattled his skull painfully, and he made a mental note to never accept a line of crushed mystery downers from seasoned pill heads ever again.Whatever it was still stung his nose, and Kevin wrinkled it in irritation.

He looked around the room for the girl he’d invited over (what was her name?), but soon realized she must have abandoned him too.Maybe she went with his friends, found some other guy at some other party.Maybe she’d found one of his friends...Not that it really mattered, he’d just find another.Kevin had stopped becoming emotionally attached to the girls he slept around with, a long time ago (not since one girl in particular, one who he hadn't heard from in years...).What was the point when they’d always choose someone else in the end?He couldn’t blame them, it made sense.

High school dropout.Blackout at a party.Bringing strangers and drugs into his parents’ house and abandoning his siblings when they needed him most.

Stuart was right: Kevin was fuckin’ useless; a waste of space, and a drunk piece of shit. 

And Kenny was right too. 

Kevin took another hearty swig of he-didn’t-even-know-what-the-fuck before downing the rest of it, feeling the familiar sting of guilt slowly subside to a comfortable numb and coddling self-loathing.

He had turned out just like his father. 


End file.
